Schizophrenia - Research Paper Example

Schizophrenia The essay aims to address a two-fold objective to wit to research the patient’s diagnosis; and (2) to make a psychiatric assessment and analyze the patient’s diagnosis.SchizophreniaIntroductionSchizophrenia is a chronic, severe, and disabling brain disorder that has affected 1% of the American population (National Institute of Mental Health, 2009, p. 1). People diagnosed with schizophrenia are often stigmatized in the society because most of the people believed that they are violent individuals.

Types of schizophrenia include paranoid, catatonic, disorganized, undifferentiated, and residual schizophrenia. Diagnosis of the types of schizophrenia is made according to the predominant symptoms: positive, negative, or cognitive symptoms. Experts think that schizophrenia may be caused by genetic predisposition, environment, and different brain chemistry and structure; thus, exact cause is unknown and anti-psychotic treatments are usually designed to alleviate the symptoms (National Institute of Mental Health, 2009, p. 6-8).Patient’s Diagnosis and Psychiatric Assessment The patient is a 42-year old, single, and black female.

Psychiatric assessment of the patient revealed a diagnosis of paranoid schizophrenia, a condition characterized by persecutory or grandiose delusions and hallucinations and excessive religiosity. The patient stated that every night, Oprah Winfrey was climbing through her 5th floor apartment window, trying to force her to write letters so that Oprah could get into her mind and take all the information in her mind such as bank accounts and family history. This assessment illustrates persecutory hallucinations (a positive symptom) characterized by seeing or hearing things that orders that orders the person to do something (National Institute of Mental Health, 2009, p. 4). The patient also believed that she’s a prophet from God that was sent to the world to pray day and night for the people.

Again, this is also a positive symptom, particularly a false belief or delusion of persecution of a schizophrenic person, believing that they are someone else, such as a prophet or any famous historical figures (National Institute of Mental Health, 2009, p. 4). Another psychiatric assessment that would support the diagnosis of paranoid schizophrenia is extreme religiosity which is also evident in the patient’s condition. The patient verbalized a lot about high heel shoes and missing being in church.

In addition, patients with paranoid schizophrenia often have thought disorders (National Institute of Mental Health, 2009, p. 5). For instance, the nurse questioned the patient about relapse prevention and the patient’s answer is illogical to the question and hard to understand stating that her sister will going to take care of her and that she will continue to take her medications because she wants to be normal and she knows that they will help her. Analysis People with schizophrenia are often not violent; however, violence may be observed particularly when delusion of persecution threatened the safety of the patient.

Diagnosis of paranoid schizophrenia was made upon assessment of the patient due observance of suspicious behaviors of the patient. The type of antipsychotic treatments depends upon the predominant symptoms experienced by the patient; it may be positive, negative, or cognitive. Since patients are suspicious, assurance of safety and correcting delusions and hallucinations are the priorities of nursing care. Patient may refuse to eat or follow nursing care due to suspicion. In this case, assuring safety by demonstrating how the food was prepared will encourage the patient to eat.

In addition, because some delusions and hallucinations may trigger violent reaction, harm to patient and others must be prevented. ReferenceNational Institute of Mental Health. (2009). Schizophrenia. National Institute of Mental Health, 1-22. Retrieved on October 7, 2011 from http://www.nimh.nih.gov/health/publications/schizophrenia/schizophrenia-booket 2009.pdf.