Somatoform and dissociative disorders

Question 1

somatic symptoms

Answer 1

• primarily caused by psychosocial factors
• trigger excessive anxiety and concern
• often reactions to extreme stress

Question 2

Factitious disorder

Answer 2

• when doc’s cant find a medical cause for a patients sym
• Malingering- faking the funk to get an external gain
• Physical symptoms are faked or intentionally caused to receive attention or to get out of something unpleasant
• Munchhausen syndrome

Question 3

Munchhausen syndrome by proxy

Answer 3

• A factitious disorder where a physical illness is intentionally cause in another person to receive vicarious or indirect sympathy or attention.
• more common in women
• common among people who have worked as a nurse, lab tech, med aide, extensive medical treatment as a kid

Question 4

Conversion disorder

Answer 4

• Physical symptoms are unconsciously created/experienced to relieve psychological distress
• neurological symptoms are medically unexplained
• affect voluntary motor or sensory functioning
• Hard to distinguish from genuine problems
• usually begins late childhood and young adults
• appears twice as often in women

Question 5

Somatic symptom disorder

Answer 5

• People become excessively distressed, concerned and anxious about bodily symptoms that they are experiencing (Not caused by a medical problem)
• major distress and energy expenditure
• consistent and last for more than 6 months
• usually with organ systems
• briquets syndrome

Question 6

What are the two types of Somatic symptom disorder

Answer 6

1. Somatization pattern
   - Many long lasting physical ailments that have little to no organic basis
   - ailments include pain, gastrointestinal, sexual, and neurological symptoms
   - dramatic and exaggerated
   - go from doc to doc
2. Predominate pattern
   - Primary feature is pain
   - Often develops after an accident or illness that has caused genuine pain

Question 7

Causes of conversion and somatic symptom disorders

- psychodyanmic view

Answer 7

Used to be called hysterical disorders

• psychodynamic view
  
  • freud believed they represented a conversion of underlying emotional conflicts into physical symptoms
  • electra complex- girls develop a pattern of sexual desires for their fathers and must compete with mothers for his attention
  • theoriest today still believe in in unconscious conflicts carried from childhood
    
    • Primary gain- bodily symptoms keep internal conflicts out of conscious
    • secondary gain- bodily symptoms further enable people to avoid unpleasant activities or receive sympathy from others

Question 8

Behavioral View

Answer 8

• physical symptoms of hysterical disorders bring rewards to sufferers
• may remove an individual from from unpleasant situatio
• bring attention
• if rewarded they may display more

Question 9

Cognitive view

Answer 9

• propose disorders are a form of conversion providing a means to express difficult emotions
• emotions converted into physical symptoms

Question 10

Multicultural view

Answer 10

• western bias
• inferior way of dealing with dealing with emotions
• Bodily and psychological reactions influenced by culture

Question 11

How are conversion and somatic disorders treated?

Answer 11

• Insight- often psychodynamically oriented
• Exposure- client thinks about traumatic event that triggered the symptoms
• Drug therapy - antidepressants

Addresses physical symptoms

• suggestions - emotional support may include hypnosis
• reinforcement - behavioral attempt to change reward structures
• confrontation- force patients out of the sick role

Question 12

Illness anxiety disorder (hypochondriasis)

Answer 12

• chronic anxiety about health
• despite the absence of somatic symptoms
• early childhood and equal in both sexes
• late least 6 months
• Views
  
  • behaviorist- classical conditioning or modeling
  • cognitive- oversensitivity to body cues

Treatment

• antidepressants
• exposure and response prevention
• cognitive -behavioral therapies