Monday, December 3, 2012

Schizophrenia

New Findings

Schizophrenia affects about 1 per cent of the United States population; it is quite a complex disorder to understand and diagnose.  The cause of Schizophrenia is still unknown, but it is theorized that genes may play a big role in the development of this psychological disorder.  It is difficult to diagnose because of the interrelation with other psychological disorders such as Bipolar.  Some symptoms include auditory hallucinations, disturbed thought processes, and difficulty identifying real from unreal. 
New research suggests "impairments in the early stages of sensory information processing are associated with a constellation of abnormalities in schizophrenia patients". This research was conducted by Gregory Light, an associate professor of psychiatry at University of California San Diego,and consisted of recording patterns of electrical activity of  410 schizophrenia patients.  he used 247 non psychiatric subjects to compare with the schizophrenia patients.  His findings showed reduced activity of certain areas of the medial frontal lobe in schizophrenia patients when exposed to changes in auditory tones.  According to the research findings, this suggests that there may be relationship between impairments in sensory information processing and schizophrenia. This new research may be groundbreaking in the search for  the cause of schizophrenia.  May it be possible to detect this impairment and be able to somehow "prevent" the development of this disorder?
Take a look at this video of Heather, a schizophrenia patient:

Source:
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/11/121130222143.htm