14 DAY TRIAL // In spite of recent advancements in developing treatments for schizophrenia and related disorders, the conditions still remain debilitating, disabling, and without permanent cure.
Even in the developed world, where people have access to the best treatments available, there is little doctors can do to improve schizophrenia symptoms.
Scientists admit that their understanding of the condition, even though improved from decades ago, is still minimal, which means that the full-fledged cure is still years away.
The chronic condition is still extremely expensive to treat, and takes a huge toll on societal expenditures and public healthcare systems. Additionally, it represents a large burden to patients and their caregivers.
Generally, diagnosing schizophrenia and related conditions revolves around demonstrating alterations in the physical structure of the brain. Additionally, experts also have to detect a host of defects that may occur in neurotransmission.
This particular term is used to refer to the way chemicals known as neurotransmitters move about inside the brain. These substances are essential for passing on electrical signals between neurons.
One of the most important neurotransmitters is called dopamine, and deviations in its regular concentrations and flows have been found to play an important role in underlying schizophrenia.
In past studies, increased dopamine action has been increased with a series of positive effects typical to the disorder, such as hallucinations and delusions.
But it was also correlated with a host of negative side-effects, including, but not limited to restricted range and intensity of emotional expression, reduced thought and speech, and social withdrawal.
One of the things that makes this particular range of conditions so difficult to diagnose and treat is the fact that they exhibit an extremely wide range of symptoms, whose number and complexity varies from patient to patient.
These symptoms, which are extremely heterogeneous, and may be indicators of other conditions if taken separately, also exhibit massive variations in time, experts add.
It is widely known among specialists that 2 to 3 percent of the young population will at one time experience one or more symptoms or episodes associated with a schizophrenia-related disorder.
It is also known that many of these individuals will go on to experience relapsing episodes of the condition, which get progressively worst with time, eventually rendering them incapable of separating fact from fiction.