Schizophrenia

Question 1

Schizophrenia is characterised by

Answer 1

Continuous or relapsing episodes of psychosis

Question 2

Symptoms of schizophrenia

Answer 2

Hallucinations (typically hearing voices), delusions, and disorganized thinking. Other symptoms include social withdrawal, decreased emotional expression, and apathy

Question 3

Delusions

Answer 3

Fixed false beliefs held with complete conviction despite contrary evidence, not culturally appropriate, usually have personal significance and often persecutory, or bizarre

Question 4

Positive or negative hallucinations

Answer 4

Fixed false sensations without an external stimulus perceived as genuine, usually auditory, but can be any modality.

Question 5

Are schizophrenics aware their beliefs are incorrect?

Answer 5

No

Question 6

Positive symptoms

Answer 6

Delusions, hallucinations, thought disorder

Question 7

Negative symptoms

Answer 7

Lack of drive, social interaction, speech

Question 8

Acute schizophrenia

Answer 8

Mainly positive symptoms, florid early in disorder

Question 9

Chronic schizophrenia

Answer 9

Often negative symptoms, with flare ups, resistant to therapy

Question 10

Most common age of onset

Answer 10

Early 20s

Question 11

Sex ratio

Answer 11

Equal, but men develop earlier and more severely

Question 12

Suicide risk increased by

Answer 12

3x

Question 13

Most common treatment

Answer 13

Antipsychotics

Question 14

Antipsychotic examples

Answer 14

Chlorpromazine, haloperidol, olanzapine, clozapine

Question 15

How do antipsychotics work?

Answer 15

Block D2 receptors

Question 16

Antipsychotics only effective against

Answer 16

Positive symptoms

Question 17

Macroscopic brain changes

Answer 17

Ventricular enlargement (largest change, surrounding brain is smaller)

Decreased brain volume and weight (-3%)

Smaller cortical volume

Smaller grey matter volume

Relatively smaller hippocampus

Relatively smaller thalamus

Larger basal ganglia - due to antipsychotics

Question 18

Is schizophrenia associated with degeneration?

Answer 18

No

Question 19

Delusion formation based on

Answer 19

Failure to integrate sensory perceptions with internal world, or failure to distinguish the two.

Question 20

Dopamine hypothesis

Answer 20

Excess dopamine function underlies positive symptoms. This is true, as shown by PET and SPET, for striatal dopamine.

Question 21

Cognitive and negative symptoms may be due to

Answer 21

Insufficient cortical dopamine. Known reciprocal regulation of striatal vs cortical dopamine