Introduction To Psychiatry Flashcards
What is neurology?
Disorders of nervously system with established aetiologies, demonstratable anatomonal pathology and physical symptoms. E.g. Parkinson’s, stroke,, epilepsy, Hunington’s disease, brain injury
What is psychiatry?
Disorders of mood, thought and behavioural with no or only minor physical sings and no visible pathology
What is the difference between functional and organic psychiatry?
Functional - neurotic disorders (e.g. depression, anxiety, phobias) or psychotic disorders (e.g. schizophrenia, bipolar disorder) -Can’t really detect much change in the brain
Organic - e..g dementia, psychiatric manifestations of epilepsy or Parkinson’s or stroke, acquired or traumatic brain injury, Huntington’s disease, drug-induced states ect. -Can detect a change in the brain
What is psychopharmacotherapy?
This is when you identify chemical imbalances, changes in transmitters and receptors and attempt to correct with drugs.
These drugs revolutionised psychiatry as before this, many of these patients were locked up as they were dangerous.
Other than psychopharmacotherapy, what is another approach to mental illness?
Psychotherapy / social approaches:
To seek to understand, work through, find resolutions and adaptations to mental illness that respects from upbringing and environmental factors.
Why do we need classification?
To enable clinicians to communicate with each other about patients
To understand implications of diagnosis (Sx, prognosis, treatment etc.)
To facilitate research
And relate research findings to everyday practice.
What is a diagnosis?
Knowing the underlying cause of symptoms and signs.
But, rarely can do it in psychiatry as we do not know the underlying cause (except in organic condition)
What is a disorder?
A clinically recognisable set of symptoms or behaviour associated in most cases with distress and with interference with personal functions. Social deviance or conflict alone, without personal dysfunction, should not be included in mental disorder as defined here.
What are most psychiatric disorders based on?
Based on recognisable cluster of symptoms and behaviours NOT based on theoretical concepts or aetiology
What is the different between a sign and a symptom?
Symptom: Experienced and reported by the patient
Sign: Discovered by doctor during examination
What are the criticisms of classification?
Categorisation denies consideration of unique personal difficulties.
Labels deviant behaviour as an illness.
Individuals do not fit neatly into categories.
Stigma
What are the pros and cons of trying to put everybody into categories?
Agreed definitions improve reliability
BUT, criteria are often arbitrary
Many patients do not fit descriptions
OR, they meet the criteria for two or more categories.
What is the purpose of psychiatric genetics?
To aid classification
Risk elimination
To assist in the development of new treatments
What are the different study designs that can be used to study psychiatry?
Family study - familial aggregation suggests shared disease genes and / or environment
Two studies - if genes important then MZ>DZ concordance. But, of concordance is less than 100% then something else is causing that.
Adoption studies - genes vs environment. (Gold standard)
How likely are you to get schizophrenia?
1% risk in general population
8-10% in siblings
45% in monozygotic twins
Shows aetiology is multifactorial
