Schizophrenia is a chronic, severe, debilitating mental illness, it affects men about one and a half times more commonly than women.

Schizophrenia is one of the psychotic mental disorders and is characterized by symptoms of thought, behavior, and social problems. The thought problems associated with schizophrenia are described as psychosis, in that the person’s thinking is completely out of touch with reality at times. For example, the sufferer may hear voices, smell odors, detect tastes, see people that are in no way present, or feel like bugs are crawling on their skin when there are none.

The first episode of schizophrenia tends to occur from 18-25 years of age for men, the age of onset for women peaks initially from 25-30 years of age and again at about 40 years of age. Patients who experience the first episode of this mental illness after the age of 40 years are considered to have late-onset schizophrenia.

An individual can have various predominant symptoms of schizophrenia at different times as well as at the same time, the most recent Diagnostic Manual for Mental Disorders (DSM-5) has done away with what used to be described as five types of schizophrenia.

Symptoms

According to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM), symptoms of schizophrenia include the following:

Positive, more overtly psychotic symptoms

• Delusions are beliefs that have no basis in reality. Types of delusions include erotic, grandiose (for example, religious or false belief or superiority), jealous, persecutory, physical (somatic), mixed, and nonspecific.
• Hallucinations: hearing (for example, hearing voices), seeing, feeling (for example, feeling like bugs are crawling on the skin), smelling, or tasting things that have no basis in reality
• Disorganized speech: incoherent or often grossly off-topic (derailed) speech
• Disorganized behaviors

Negative symptoms, potentially less overtly psychotic

• Inhibition of facial expressions and/or a lack of emotional responsiveness
• Catatonic behaviors: difficulty moving, resistance to moving, hyperactivity, repetitive or otherwise abnormal movements, and/or nonsense word repetition or of what others say or do.
• Self-neglect, poor grooming, and lack of good hygiene
• Lack of speech
• Apathy/lack of motivation

Prior to the development of the full-blown disorder, people who go on to develop schizophrenia often exhibit subtler and/or less specific symptoms, also called prodromal symptoms. Some characteristics of prodromal schizophrenia are thought to include:

• slowness in activity and thought, lower cognitive functioning, including memory loss, disorientation, and mental confusion.
• abnormal speech, including circumstantial, vague, or stereotyped speech.
• odd ideas that have not reached the level of being delusions, like feeling detached from themselves, having beliefs that an ordinary event has special and personal meaning, or a belief that their thoughts aren’t their own.
• mood problems, like general discontent, inappropriate emotional responses, fear, mistrust, hostility, anger, aggression, excitability, agitation, and inability to feel pleasure in activities they used to enjoy; and
• social isolation, the self-centeredness that borders on narcissism, and other problems socializing.

What causes schizophrenia?

Schizophrenia is not directly passed from one generation to another genetically, and there is no single specific cause for this illness. Rather, it is the result of psychological and environmental risk factors.

The causes of schizophrenia are believed to be:

• Biological: It is thought that people who have abnormalities in the brain’s neurochemical dopamine and lower brain matter in some areas of the brain are at higher risk for developing the condition. Other brain issues that are thought to predispose people to develop schizophrenia include:
  • abnormalities in the connections between different areas of the brain and
  • potential abnormalities in the transmission of the brain neurochemical glutamate.
• Genetic: Schizophrenia is thought to have a significant but not solely genetic component. People who have immediate family members (first-degree relatives) with psychosis are more vulnerable to developing schizophrenia compared to people who do not have such a family history.
• Environmental: The risks of developing schizophrenia can even occur before birth. For example, the risk of schizophrenia is increased in individuals whose father is of advanced age or whose mother was malnourished or had one of the certain infections during pregnancy. Difficult life circumstances during childhood, like
  • the early loss of a parent, parental poverty, bullying, witnessing domestic violence.
  • being the victim of emotional, sexual, or physical abuse or of physical or emotional neglect; and
  • insecure attachment has been associated with increased risks of developing this illness.
• Drug use: Use of marijuana (cannabis), cocaine, Methamphetamine (Known as crank, glass, ice and crystal meth), Oxycodone (a synthetic version of an opioid, allopathic painkiller for severe or chronic pain), ketamine (an allopathic anesthetic), Morphine (can be debilitating leading to anxiety and depression), Diazepam (or Valium), Xanax (benzodiazepine or Alprazolam), amphetamines, Fentanyl is legally prescribed for chronic pain but is fast becoming one of the most dangerous addictive painkillers. It’s estimated that powerful opioids, are responsible for over 70% of drug-related deaths.

{Drugs like these (the list is long) hallucinogens have been found to increase the risk of developing schizophrenia}.

Schizophrenia in children

Schizophrenia in young children is rare. Although there have been fewer studies on schizophrenia in children compared to adults, researchers are finding that children as young as 6 years of age can be found to have all the symptoms of their adult counterparts and continue to have those symptoms into adulthood.

Diagnosis

As is true with virtually any mental health diagnosis in allopathic way of treatment, there is no one test that definitively indicates that someone has schizophrenia. Therefore, professionals diagnose this illness by gathering comprehensive medical, family, and mental health information.

In asking questions about mental health symptoms, mental health professionals are often exploring if the individual suffers from hallucinations or delusions, depression and/or mania (for example, excessive anger or elevated mood, inappropriate emotional responses, rapid, pressured, and/or frenzied speaking, a lack of behavioral restraint, overexcitement, decreased need for sleep).

Symptoms as occurs in bipolar disorder or schizoaffective disorder, anxiety, substance abuse, as well as some personality disorders (like schizotypal personality disorder) and developmental disorders (for example, autism spectrum disorders including the condition that was formerly called Asperger disorder).

How long symptoms occur is a factor in determining a diagnosis. For example, psychosis sufferers whose symptoms resolve in no more than a month may qualify for the diagnosis of the schizophreniform disorder rather than schizophrenia.

Since some of the symptoms of schizophrenia can also occur in other psychiatric illnesses, the mental health screening is to assess if the individual suffers from schizoaffective disorder or other psychotic disorder, depressive disorder, bipolar disorder, an anxiety disorder, a personality disorder, or a substance-abuse/drug-induced psychosis (as explained above).

Any disorder that is associated with bizarre behavior, mood, or thinking, like another psychotic disorder, borderline personality disorder, or dissociative identity disorder (DID), previously called multiple personality disorder (MPD), may be particularly challenging to distinguish from schizophrenia.

Allopathic treatments for schizophrenia

There is currently no cure for schizophrenia in allopathic medicine, but there are a number of helpful treatments available, of which medication remains the cornerstone of treatment for patients with this condition. These medications are often referred to as antipsychotics since they help decrease the intensity of psychotic symptoms. Many health care professionals prescribe one of these medications, sometimes in combination with one or more other psychiatric medications, in order to maximize the benefit for the person with schizophrenia.

Mood-stabilizer medications can be useful in treating mood swings that sometimes occur in individuals who have diagnosable mood disorder in addition to psychotic symptoms. These medications may take a bit longer to work compared to antipsychotic medications.

Antidepressant medications are the primary allopathic treatment for depression that can often accompany schizophrenia. Examples of antidepressants that are commonly prescribed for that purpose include serotonergic (SSRI) medications that affect levels of the neurotransmitter serotonin and combination serotonergic/adrenergic medications (SNRIs).

Despite its stigmatized history, electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) can be a viable treatment for people whose schizophrenia has inadequate respond to a number of allopathic trials and psychosocial interventions.

Prognosis for schizophrenia

With allopathic treatment possible complications for schizophrenia range from more medical conditions (morbidity) or shortened life span (mortality) to negative impacts on their family members as well. For example, people with schizophrenia who continue to suffer from residual symptoms have more trouble thinking than those whose negative symptoms are adequately managed with treatment.

Individuals with schizophrenia have more than twice the rate of death than those without the disorder. Almost half of people with schizophrenia will suffer from a drug-use disorder (for example antidepressants, anti-anxiety etc – as explained earlier in this article) during their lifetime.

Research shows that patients with schizophrenia or schizoaffective disorder have a better quality of life with Homeopathic treatment.

Homeopathic Treatment for Schizophrenia

Given the seriousness and chronic nature of schizophrenia, self-care without also getting treatment by a professional or home remedies are not deemed appropriate treatment for this illness.

Homeopathy treats not only the disease/disorder itself but the root cause; that’s why with Homeopathic treatment schizophrenic patients can be treated and could live absolutely normal life without any addiction to the drugs and/or lifetime medication.

Here are few medicines good for schizophrenia according to my knowledge (Dr Qaisar Ahmed MD, DHMS):

Cuprum Aceticum

Apoplexy. Brain affections. Memory weak; brain functions decreased. Absent-minded. Fixed ideas. Brow ague. Cerebro-spinal meningitis. Cholera Asiatica. Chorea. Maniacal talk; wakes screaming and scolding; tries to escape. sudden indistinct and double vision (paralysis of abducens nerve). Fear of falling. Vertigo with stupefaction; evacuation of bowels. Violent cephalalgia, with thirst and violent colic. Hallucinations. Mania. Hydrocephalus. Measles. Paralyses. Scarlatina. Inflammation of brain. Tetanic condition of jaws. Strabismus. Tapeworm. Uremia.

Cuprum Metallicum

Chlorosis. Cholera. Chorea. Convulsions. Cramps. Cyanosis. Dyspnea. Emissions. Epilepsy. Melancholy with attacks of extreme anguish. Fainting. Convulsive laughter. Incoherent, delirious talk. Mildness, alternating with obstinacy. Gastric disturbance. Hematemesis. Dementia. Loss of sense and thought. Mania/Hysteria. Headache, in consequence of an epileptic attack. Inflammations. Larynx spasm. Spasmodic distortion of facial muscles. Meningitis. Neuralgia. Palpitation. Paralysis. Psoriasis. Ringworm. Insomnia. Spasms, spasm in the jaw. Spinal irritation.

Thuja Occidentalis

Fixed ideas, hallucinations of a strange person were at his side; as if soul and body were separated; as if something alive in abdomen. Emotional sensitiveness; music causes weeping and trembling. Headache as if pierced by a nail.

Ignatia Amara

Taciturn, with continuous sad thoughts; still, serious melancholy, with moaning. Sadness and concentrated sorrow, with sighing. Irresolution; anxious to do now this, now that. Impatience. Strong disposition to be frightened. Morose and discontented humor, and involuntary reflections on painful and disagreeable things. Intolerance of noise. Effrontery. Tenderness of disposition and of conscience. Inconstancy. Alternation of foolish gaiety and tearful sadness. Laconic speech. Severe weakness of memory. Love of solitude. Anguish, sometimes with palpitation of the heart.

Lachrymose and apathetic humor, with dread of exertion. Inclination to grief, without saying anything about it. Changeable disposition; jesting and laughing, changing to sadness, with shedding of tears (hysteria). Despair of being cured. The least contradiction excites rage and passion, with redness of face. Fearfulness, timidity. Anger, followed by quiet grief and sorrow. Fear of robbers at night. Cries, and complete discouragement, at the least provocation.

Vertigo; with sparks before the eyes. Great heaviness of the head, as if it were full of blood. Painful sensation of expansion in the head, as if the cranium were going to burst, especially when conversing, reading, or listening to others. Trembling of the head. Throwing of the head backwards. Hair fall.

Crocus sativus

Great distraction and forgetfulness. Extraordinarily changeable mood. Mournfulness alternating with cheerfulness. Inclination to joke, laugh and sing. Gay insanity with buffoonery. Angry and flying into a passion, alternating with gentleness. Vertigo with fainting. Whirling, and feeling of intoxication in forehead when in room, but not in open air, with occipital headache and pains in eyes. Sudden thrusts in forehead and temples (by artificial light).

Coffea Cruda

Over-sensitiveness; weeping mood. Great anguish; cannot be composed even not able to hold the pen; trembles. Sentimental ecstasy; excited imagination; increased power to think. Excessive weeping and lamentations over trifles. The pains seem insupportable, driving to despair. Fright from sudden pleasant surprises.

Pains in the head, as if the brain were bruised, semi-lateral cephalalgia. Feeling of, as if a nail were driven into the parietal bone. In the vertex feels and hears a cracking, when sitting quietly. Heaviness of the head. Congestion in the head, especially when speaking (or after a pleasant surprise). Ecstasy. Excitement. Hysteria. Joy, ill-effects. Over-sensitiveness. Shock. Insomnia.

Nattum Sulphurcum

Melancholy, with periodical attacks of mania. Suicidal tendency; must exercise restraint. Inability to think. Dislikes to speak, or to be spoken to. Vertigo. Effects of falls and injuries to the head, and mental troubles arising therefrom. Dreams of running water.

Rauwolfia Serpentina

Nervous system and reduces anxiety. Insanity/Mania. Unknown emotional excitability but irritative person. cerebral hypotonia, lack of tone in nerves and circulatory system, congestive vascular conditions, insomnia.  Insanity. Violent maniacal symptoms. Aggression, mood swings, depression. Delirium; frightful images; furious; rages, bites, strikes; desire to escape. Loss of consciousness. Disinclined to talk.

Rauwolfia serpentina mother tincture uses to reduce noradrenaline which relaxes the blood vessels and improves blood flow especially to the brain.

Calcarea Carbonicum

Apprehensive; worse towards evening; fears loss of reason, misfortune, contagious diseases. Forgetful, confused, low-spirited. Anxiety with tachycardia. Obstinacy: slight mental effort produces hot head. Averse to work or exertion. Sense of weight on top of head. Headache, with cold hands and feet. Vertigo on ascending, and when turning head. Headache from over lifting, from mental exertion, with nausea. Head feels hot and heavy, with pale face. Open fontanelles: head enlarged; much perspiration, wets the pillow. Itching of the scalp. Scratches head on waking.

Platinum Metallicum

Irresistible impulse to kill. Self-exaltation; contempt for others. Arrogant, proud. Weary of everything. Everything seems changed. Mental trouble pressed menses. Physical symptoms disappear as mental symptoms develop.

Tense, pressing headache, confined to a small spot. Cramp like, squeezing pain. Constriction about forehead and temples. Numbness, with headache.

Plumbum Metallicum

Mental depression. Fear of being assassinated. Quiet melancholy. Slow perception; loss of memory; amnesic aphasia. Hallucinations and delusions. Intellectual apathy. Memory impaired. Paretic dementia. Delirium alternating with colic. Pain as if a ball rose from throat to brain. Hair very dry. Tinnitus.

Belladonna

Patient lives in a world of his own, engrossed by specters and visions and oblivious to surrounding realities. While the retina is insensible to actual objects, a host of visual hallucinations throng about him and come to him from within. He is acutely alive and crazed by a flood of subjective visual impressions and fantastic illusions. Hallucinations; sees monsters, hideous faces. Delirium; frightful images; furious; rages, bites, strikes; desire to escape. Loss of consciousness. Disinclined to talk. Perversity, with tears. Acuteness of all senses. Changeableness.

Vertigo, with falling to left side or backwards. Sensitive to least contact. Much throbbing and heat. Palpitation reverberating in head with labored breathing. Pain; fullness. Boring of head into pillow; drawn backward and rolls from side to side. Constant moaning. Hair splits; is dry and comes out. Ill effects from colds, having hair cut etc.

Lachesis Mutus

Great loquacity. Amative. Sad: no desire to mix with the world. Restless and uneasy; does not wish to attend to business; wants to be off somewhere all the time. Jealous. Mental labor best performed at night. Euthanasia. Suspicious; nightly delusion of fire. Religious insanity. Derangement of the time sense. Pain through head on awaking. Sun headaches. With headache, flickering, dim vision, very pale face. Vertigo.

Tarentula Hispanica

Sudden alteration of mood. Foxy. Destructive impulses; moral relaxation. Must constantly busy herself or walk. Sensitive to music. Averse to company but wants someone present. Ungrateful, discontented. Guided by whims. Intense headache, as if thousands of needles were pricking into brain. Vertigo. Wants hair brushed or head rubbed.

Veratrum Album

Melancholy, with stupor and mania. Sits in a stupid manner; notices nothing; Sullen indifference. Frenzy of excitement; shrieks, curses. Puerperal mania. Aimless wandering from home. Delusions of impending misfortunes. Mania, with desire to cut and tear things. Attacks of pain, with delirium driving to madness. Cursing, howling all night. Contracted features. Cold sweat on forehead. Sensation of a lump of ice on vertex. Headache, with nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, pale face. Neck too weak to hold head up.

Arsenicum Album

Great anguish and restlessness. Changes place continually. Fears, fear of death, of being left alone. Great fear with cold sweat. Thinks it useless to take medicine. Suicidal. Hallucinations of smell and sight. Despair drives him from place to place. Miserly, malicious, selfish, lacks courage. General sensibility increased. Sensitive to disorder and confusion. Hemicrania, with icy feeling of scalp and great weakness. Delirium tremens; cursing and raving; vicious. Head is in constant motion. Scalp itches intolerably; circular patches of bare spots; rough, dirty, sensitive, and covered with dry scales; nightly burning and itching; dandruff. Scalp very sensitive; cannot brush hair.

Baryta Carbonica

Loss of memory, mental weakness. Irresolute. Lost confidence in himself. Senile dementia. Confusion. Bashful. Aversion to strangers. Childish; grief over trifles. Vertigo; stitches, when standing in the sun, extending through head. Brain feels as if loose. Hair falls out. Confusion. Wens.

Stramonium

Devout, earnest, beseeching and ceaseless talking. Loquacious, garrulous, laughing, singing, swearing, praying, rhyming. Sees ghosts, hears voices, talks with spirits. Rapid changes from joy to sadness. Violent and lewd. Delusions about his identity; thinks himself tall, double, a part missing. Religious mania. Cannot bear solitude or darkness; must have light and company. Sight of water or anything glittering brings on spasms. Delirium, with desire to escape.

Kali Bromatum

General failure of mental power, loss of memory, melancholia, senselessness of the mucous membranes, especially of eyes, throat, and skin; acne; loss of sexual desire, paralysis. Suicidal mania with tremulousness. Mental dullness, and slowness of expression. Epilepsy (in patients with salt-free diet). Mind profound, melancholic delusion; feeling of moral deficiency; religious depression; delusions of conspiracies against him. Night terrors. Horrid illusions. Active delirium.

Hyoscyamus Niger

Some epileptic fits are followed by a deep sleep. Perfect picture of mania of a quarrelsome and obscene character. Inclined to be unseemly and immodest in acts, gestures and expressions. Very talkative, and persists in stripping herself, or uncovering genitals. Is jealous, afraid of being poisoned. Very suspicious. Talkative, obscene, lascivious mania uncovers body; jealous, foolish. Great hilarity; inclined to laugh at everything. Delirium, with attempt to run away. Low, muttering speech; constant carphologia, deep stupor, fidgeting with bedclothes, fidgeting with fingers, and muscular twitching. Pupils dilated, sparkling, fixed. Eyes open, but does not pay attention; downcast and dull, fixed, spasmodic closing of lids.

Cannabis Indica

Excessive loquacity; exuberance of spirits. Time seems too long; seconds seem ages; a few rods an immense distance. Constantly theorizing. Anxious depression; constant fear of becoming insane. Mania must constantly move. Very forgetful; cannot finish sentence. Is lost in delicious thought. Uncontrollable laughter. Delirium tremens. Clairvoyance. Emotional excitement; rapid change of mood. Cannot realize her identity, chronic vertigo as of floating off. Feels as if top of head were opening and shutting and as if calvarium were being lifted. Shocks through brain. Uremic headache. Throbbing and weight at occiput. Involuntary shaking of head. Migraine attack preceded by unusual excitement with loquacity.

Morphinum

Profound depression. Irritable, fault-finding, hysterical. Shock induced by terror. Dream-like state. Vertigo from the least movement of the head. Headache with sensation of being “wound-up”. Bursting pain; head drawn back.

Opium

Patient wants nothing. Complete loss of consciousness; apoplectic state. Frightful fancies, daring, gay, bright. Unable to understand or appreciate his sufferings. Thinks he is not at home. Delirious talking, with wide open eyes. Vertigo; lightness. Dull, heavy, stupid. Delirium. Vertigo after fright. Pain in back of head; great weight there. Bursting feeling. Complete insensibility; no mental grasp for anything. Paralysis of brain.

Mancinella

Sudden vanishing of thought forgets from one moment to next what she/he wishes to do. Everything irksome. Fear of getting crazy. Fera of evil spirits. Averse to work and answering questions. Sadness. Anxiety. Homesick. Bashful and taciturn; timid look. Vertigo: stupefying; with loss of consciousness. Sense of lightness (or emptiness) in head. Sudden Sticking in temple and above eye. Headache: with impatience; caused by light. Pulsating pains in head and neck, preventing writing. Itching of scalp; hair falls out.

Medorrhinum

Weak memory. Loses the thread of conversation. Cannot speak without weeping. Time passes too slowly. Is in a great hurry. Hopeless of recovery. Difficult concentration. Fears going insane. Sensibility exalted. Nervous, restless. Fear in the dark and of someone behind her/him. Melancholy, with suicidal thoughts. Burning pain in brain. Head heavy and drawn backward. Headache from jarring of cars, exhaustion, or hard work. Weight and pressure in vertex. Hair dry, crispy. Itching of scalp.

Nux Vomica

The typical Nux patient is rather thin, spare, quick, active, nervous, and irritable, sensitive to all impressions. Ugly, malicious. Cannot bear noises, odors, light, etc. Does not want to be touched. Time passes too slowly. Even the least ailment affects her greatly. Disposed to reproach others. Sullen, fault-finding. Over sensitiveness. Headache in the sunshine. Photophobia.

Anacardium Orientale

Fixed ideas. Hallucinations: thinks he is possessed of two persons or wills. Anxiety when walking, as if pursued. Profound melancholy and hypochondriasis, with tendency to use violent language. Brain-fag. Impaired memory. Absent mindedness. Very easily offended. Malicious; seems bent on wickedness. Lack of confidence in himself or others. Suspicious. Clairaudient hears voices far away or of the dead. Senile dementia. Absence of all moral restraint. Vertigo. Pressing pain worse after mental exertion-in forehead; occiput, temples, vertex; better during a meal. Itching and little boils on scalp.

Aurum Metallicum

Feeling of self-condemnation and utter worthlessness. Profound despondency, with increased blood pressure, with thorough disgust of life, and thoughts of suicide. Talks of committing suicide. Great fear of death. Peevish and vehement at least contradiction. Anthropophobia. Mental derangements. Constant rapid questioning without waiting for reply. Cannot do things fast enough. Over sensitiveness to noise, excitement, confusion. Violent pain in head. Roaring in head. Vertigo. Tearing through brain to forehead. Pain in bones extending to face. Congestion to head. Boils on scalp.

Phosphorus

Phosphorus is another excellent medicine for curing the grandiose delusion. The patients for whom this medicine is usually recommended are those possessing an exaggerated idea of self-importance; over-sensitiveness to all external impressions; depression and indifferent behavior towards family and friends and have strange imaginations e.g. that something is creeping out of every corner.  The symptoms get worse during thunderstorms.

P. S: This article is only for doctors having good knowledge about Homeopathy and allopathy, for learning purpose(s).

For proper consultation and treatment, please visit our clinic.

None of above-mentioned medicine(s) is/are the full/complete treatment, but just hints for treatment; every patient has his/her own constitutional medicine.

To order medicine by courier, please send your details at WhatsApp– +923119884588

Dr. Sayyad Qaisar Ahmed (MD {Ukraine}, DHMS), Abdominal Surgeries, Oncological surgeries, Gastroenterologist, Specialist Homeopathic Medicines.

  Senior research officer at Dnepropetrovsk state medical academy Ukraine.

Location:  Al-Haytham clinic, Umer Farooq Chowk Risalpur Sadder (0923631023, 03119884588), K.P.K, Pakistan.

Find more about Dr Sayed Qaisar Ahmed at:

https://www.youtube.com/Dr Qaisar Ahmed

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