Schizophrenia is a psychological disorder that affects the way the person thinks, communicates, feels, behaves, and perceives reality. All people diagnosed with schizophrenia experience at least one symptom of psychosis. There are multiple stressors that occur during vulnerable periods of neurological development in life that are linked to the development of schizophrenia. Hallucinations, delusions, and disorganized speech are all behaviors associated in psychosis. Treatments and medications available do not treat the disorder; however they aid in minimizing symptoms and allow the client to better grasp reality. The movie A Beautiful Mind represents schizophrenia, its symptoms, and how it affects family dynamics. Symptoms associated with schizophrenia …show more content…
Initially the safety of the patient, yourself, and others during exacerbation of the symptoms is the main concern. During hallucinations or delusions, reaffirm reality by focusing on the “here and now”, convey empathy for the patient’s fears, and maintain trust. Three groups of antipsychotic drugs are used during exacerbations and relapse prevention of schizophrenia. First generation antipsychotics are effective in treating the positive symptoms; however, they have severe extrapyramidal side effects (acute dystonia, akathisia, psuedoparkinsonism, and tardive dyskinesia). Second generation antipsychotics are often drug of choice due to the fact that they target both positive and negative symptoms while producing minimal EPS. Third generation antipsychotics consist of only one drug, Aripiprazole. This drug has very little side effects and improves positive and negative symptoms and cognitive functioning significantly. Psychotherapy that includes social support systems benefits the improvement of the person holistically. Also understanding what may trigger the symptoms may help to develop a therapeutic environment and reduced stress …show more content…
as he began his college career at Princeton as a top scholar. John Nash was an extremely intelligent mathematician who graduated with his Ph.D. at Princeton and worked on many theories throughout his life. In the movie, John seems to have only one friend, his roommate, during his stay at Princeton who helps to encourage him to persevere, who was later discovered to be a hallucination. Upon completing his thesis he is accepted to work at M.I.T. as an instructor where he began having hallucinations that he was chosen to help the government locate bombs by deciphering codes in newspapers and magazines. This made him feel like a very important man and he became paranoid that the Russians were out to get him. His wife was unaware of his illness until he began acting out of the ordinary, so she had him admitted to a psychiatric hospital. Here it took quite some time for him to return to reality. His medications controlled the symptoms but also sedated him to the point that he could no longer respond to his family which led to treatment noncompliance. Soon his symptoms exacerbated, putting his loved ones in danger resulting in a near drowning of their son. During this acute phase, John was able to discern reality on his own by reasoning why the hallucinations were nonexistent. In the movie it showed his transition back to normal functioning although the hallucinations were still present, John merely chose to fight the