Psychosis is brain damage???

I have read articles positing that psychosis causes brain damage and schizophrenia is a disease. I would like to say that episodes of fixed, clearly false beliefs (delusions) and false perceptions of reality (hallucinations) does not cause brain damage. A true belief which causes distress, because the patients friends or family disagree with it, does not cause brain damage, thus how can a false belief be the root of brain damage. It is clear that hallucinations are caused by chemicals in the brain, but how could a change in chemicals in the brain cause brain damage? There is no evidence that schizophrenia is a brain disease, like Alzheimers Disease. In fact schizophrenia is a disorder of thought, emotion and perceptions, rather than being a disease of a brain. A disease of the brain is indicated by a gradual collapse in functioning and speech. This is not seen in schizophrenia. In fact people diagnosed with schizophrenia, generally recover from the disorder, even without the aid of medications.

'Yet people with real brain disease - such as Alzheimer's, stroke, or a tumor - don't talk symbolically like [schizophrenics] do.' pg. 24 of Toxic Psychiatry
'Brain damaged people typically display memory difficulties..' from Toxic Psychiatry
'Advanced degrees of brain disease render the individual unable to think in such abstract or metaphorical terms [as schizophrenics do].' from Toxic Psychiatry


'Individuals with schizophrenia, including those who have never been treated, have a reduced volume of gray matter in the brain, especially in the temporal and frontal lobes. Recently neuroscientists have detected gray matter loss of up to 25% (in some areas). The damage started in the parietal, or outer, regions of the brain but spread to the rest of the brain over a five year period. Patients with the worst brain tissue loss also had the worst symptoms, which included hallucinations, delusions, bizarre and psychotic thoughts, hearing voices, and depression.'

from http://www.schizophrenia.com/disease.htm#significant

References

Peter R. Breggin, M.D. - Toxic Psychiatry

Interesting...

I've always been skeptical of refering to schizophrenia as a "disease". I believe that it's a lot more than just a chemical imbalance.

Hallucinations, delusions and thought disorders can be the result of brain damage. I think we all agree all of these things originate in the brain and thus are affected by the chemistry and wiring of the brain if it is damaged. There are studies that indicate brain degeneration in Schizophrenic patients. However, none of these studies are conclusive and research is very much ongoing.

Here are a few things we DO know about Schizophrenia:

1. The disease is familial
2. There are neurochemical changes
3. There are structural and neuropathological changes (brain degeneration I mentioned)
4. There are neuropsychological deficits (cognitive impairment)
5. There are neurological abnormalities (changes in the brain)
6. There are electrical abnormalities
7. There are immunological and inflammatory abnormalities
8. Individuals with Schizophrenia are born disproportionately in the winter and spring
9. Individuals with schizophrenia are born and/or raised disproportionately in urban areas.

Yes, I have studies and sources to back all of these up. Do you?

Yes, there are biological abnormalities with schizophrenia, but I don't believe that a episode of psychosis results in brain damage. This theory is confirmed by the book: Toxic Psychiatry as I mentioned.

Schizophrenia is what causes the brain damage. The delusions and hallucinations are components of the damage itself. There are areas of the brain that lose valuable tissue. A good example of this type of loss is that in the parietal lobe, which organizes certain sensory information; that is thought to be what causes hallucinations.

From what I have read/learned, antipsychotic medication tends to stop the damage, as well as antagonize dopamine receptors, which seem to have influence on the disorder (lower dopamine levels seems to disrupt the effects that schizophrenia has).

I have seen scientific studies which prove that drugs such as olanzapine cause shrinkage in the brains of monkeys. Plus a large amount of those who take neuroleptics have neurological conditions. It is not known what the long term effects of the atypical antipsychotics are either, so there use remains risky.

As for the brain damage caused by schizophrenia, I believe that it is medicines causing this as I have mentioned above.

Ecco wrote:I have seen scientific studies which prove that drugs such as olanzapine cause shrinkage in the brains of monkeys. Plus a large amount of those who take neuroleptics have neurological conditions. It is not known what the long term effects of the atypical antipsychotics are either, so there use remains risky.

As for the brain damage caused by schizophrenia, I believe that it is medicines causing this as I have mentioned above.

As the magical statistics phrase says, "correlation is not causation". Also, those medications stop brain damage.

I hit my head hard enough to cause blackouts when I was little, several times now that I think of it. I never thought that could cause mental problems. But i also have a family history, on both sides, of schizophrenia.

A pharmacist once described it to me as psychosis is the neural pathways of the brain misfiring so that for instance, two plus two equals an egg, which doesn't make sense. A picture of that is when there are two pathways in the brain side by side and usually, when the brain is functioning soundly, a synapse links to the part on the right when asked that question, which gives the answer 'four'. Psychosis (and hallucinogenic drug-taking) causes the synapse to shift its pathway to a non-normal pathway, which results in a non-usual answer which generally doesn't make as much sense as the usual one does. The pharmacist said that, with more and more experiences of psychosis, that odd neural pathway gets to become a beaten track, and if it happens too often, it becomes the main pathway the brain takes, rather than the more sane pathway a brain usually takes. Of course, difficult experiences in life can trigger the genes for schizophrenia and psychosis in those who have those genes, and drug-taking can just damage the brain in the same way so it doesn't respond as sanely and effectively as it used to after a fair while of drug-taking (chronic users, unless they already had a gene for schizophrenia or psychosis, in which case it can happen much much quicker, even after first drug experience).

I guess I tend to think he might be right after seeing people in hospital who can no longer think sanely at all after years of episodes of psychosis caused either by drugs or untreated mental illness - their families had said they were much more capable and sane before they had so many episodes of psychosis, they used to be able to hold a decent sane reasoning conversation and hold a job etc, but that all changed after so many episodes of psychosis.

See ya,

Cruisy

All I know is if a doctor tries that on me when he leaves the room I'll switch my brain scan with his & make tisk tisk sounds as he points out the damaged areas.