Revision Theme 3 Flashcards
What is psychosis?
A loss of boundaries with reality, a loss of insight, with primary features of hallucinations and delusions.
A psychotic episode = 1 week duration of symptoms at significant severity
What is a delusion?
A belief held firmly but on inadequate grounds, not affected by rational argument or evidence to the contrary. Not shared by someone of a similar cultural, age, social, religious or educational background.
Salience of attribution
Excess dopamine (reward and motivation) could lead to the world seeming pregnant with significance.
Hallucination
Perception experienced in the absence of external stimulus.
Any sensory modality but auditory is most common.
Schneider’s first rank symptoms
- auditory hallucinations (Thoughts spoken aloud, 3rd person hallucinations, running commentary)
- somatic/ tactile hallucinations
- Thought insertion, broadcast or withdrawal
- Passivity phenomena
- delusional perception
Differential
Affective psychosis
- Bipolar
- Depressive psychosis
- Schizoaffective disorder
Organic
- epilepsy
- infections
- trauma
- cerebrovascular disease
- demyelination
- velocardiofacial syndrome
- endocrine
- metabolic
- immunological
- acute drug intoxication
- toxins e.g. lead
- dementias
personality disorders
Side effects of anti-psychotics
- Parkinsonian like symptoms
- Tardive dyskinesia
- weight gain
- skin discolouration
Mental state examination
- appearance/behaviour
- speech
- mood/affect
- thought form
- thought content
- hallucinations
- insight
- cognition
Onset of schizophrenia
Male = 21-26 Female = 25-32
Neuropathology of schizophrenia : Structural changes
- Ventricular enlargement
- Reduced brain volume ( less gray matter)
- cytoarchitectural differences in cortex and hippocampus
- Decreased length paracingulate sulcus
Neurodevelopment of schizophrenia
- during adolescence gray matter is lost due to synaptic pruning and myelination
- May speed up early onset schizophrenia
Neurophysiology: Schizophrenia
- Hypofrontality during periods of high cognitive load (Wisconsin card sorting - cognitive flexibility). Leads to negative and cognitive symptoms
- Increased activity in dlPFC seen in healthy volunteers but absent in schizophrenia
- Hyper-excitable sensory cortex e.g. auditory cortex activation during hallucinations
- Abnormal neural oscillations
Dopamine (psychopharmacology schizophrenia)
- Dopamine cell bodies in midbrain > project to forebrain
- Nigrostriatal system
- Mesolimbic + Mesocortical = Mesocorticalimbic pathway (involved in reward, reinforcement, stimulus salience)
Dopamine hypothesis evidence (schizophrenia)
- Typical antipsychotics ( D2 receptor antagonists) prevent positive symptoms.
- Dopamine agonists (cocaine, amphetamine) can produce positive symptoms e.g. psychosis
Dopamine receptors
D1 (1 & 5) = gs coupled
D2 (2,3,4) = Gi coupled.
Extrapyramidal side effects
- Caused by typical antipsychotics (e.g. chlorpromazine, haloperidol)
- Parkonsonian like (inhibition of dopamine action in caudate)
- Tardive dyskinesias (up regulation of d2 =supersensitivity)
Atypical antipsychotics e.g. Clozapine = selective to d4 without EPS
Clozapine
- Atypical antipsychotics
- D4 receptor antagonist
- improves positive and negative symptoms
side effects:
- weight gain
- sedation
- hypersalivation
- neutropenia
- tachycardia
- hypotension
Atypical antipsychotics
- Clozapine
- Olanzapine
- Risperidone
- seem to increase dopamine in PFC
- decrease dopamine in Nacc
Glutamate hypothesis = evidence
- NMDA receptor/ glutamate antagonist PCP causes positive and negative symptoms
- Mice with fewer NMDA = schizophrenia symptoms
1) glutamate antagonism in PFC
2) Less glutamate firing to GABA neurons in VTA
3) Less inhibition of VTA -Nacc neurons
4) increased dopamine release Nacc
5) Less activation of VTA-PFC dopamine neurons - less glutamate = hypofrontality
Hyperactive Nacc
Hypoactive PFC
Neurocognitive deficits schizophrenia
- Typical = no improvement
- Atypicals = some improvements
- lower iq
- attentional deficits - stroop task
- working memory ( wisconsin)
- planning and informational processing deficits
Affective episodes
- Manic episode
- Hypomanic episode
- depressive episode
- mixed affective episode
Symptoms of depression
- depressed mood
- anhedonia
- psychomotor retardation
- agitation/ restlessness
- weight loss/ gain
- diurnal variation of mood
- insomnia
- feelings of guilt/worthlessness
- suicidical ideation
- somatic symptoms
- hypochondriasis
Atypical depression
- reactivity
- weight gain
- hypersomnia
- leaden paralysis
- interpersonal rejection sensitivity