Schizophrenia is a serious mental health condition that causes people suffering from it to interpret reality oddly. Its symptoms may include hallucinations, delusions, and severely irrational thinking and behavior, making it challenging to go about daily activities and incapacitate.
Schizophrenia is a chronic condition requiring long-term mental health treatment. There are 5 types of schizophrenia, which are:
- paranoid schizophrenia,
- catatonic schizophrenia,
- disorganized schizophrenia,
- residual schizophrenia, and
- undifferentiated schizophrenia.
The above all are the 5 types of schizophrenia.
Read More: Schizotypal Personality Disorder: Definition, Symptoms, and Causes.
Currently, specialists know that people with schizophrenia frequently experience overlapping symptoms throughout their lives and that these subtypes are not always helpful.
The updated “Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Diseases, Fifth Edition” introduced revisions to the diagnostic criteria for several disorders, including schizophrenia. A diagnosis might have been made based on just one symptom in the past. Now, at least two signs must be present in a person.
The DSM-5 states that the following are necessary for a diagnosis of schizophrenia:
- Two or more of the five primary symptoms. The symptoms listed include hallucinations, unpleasant symptoms, incoherent speech, strange motions, and delusions.
- Duration of symptoms: Your primary symptoms must persist for at least one month. The condition’s symptoms must also last for at least six months, whether or not the condition’s effects do as well.
- Occupational or social dysfunction. This means that the condition interferes with your capacity to function at work or in social situations (friendly, romantic, professional, or otherwise).
Types Of Schizophrenia
Even though the subtypes of schizophrenia are no longer formally recognized, they can still be helpful as diagnostic identifiers to clinicians to describe patients’ various schizophrenia-related experiences and help develop treatment strategies. The following describes the five traditional subtypes of schizophrenia.
1. Paranoid Schizophrenia
The most prevalent form of schizophrenia diagnosed before 2013 was paranoid schizophrenia. This representation of schizophrenia is most frequently seen in media and on screen. The signs of paranoid schizophrenia include:
- frequent auditory and visual hallucinations,
- obsession with one or more delusions,
- slurred speech,
- difficulty focusing, and
- severe behavioral impairment.
2. Catatonia Schizophrenia
Catatonic schizophrenia is one of the rarest forms of the illness and is less frequently diagnosed. Some specialists argue that catatonia should continue to be a significant and separate specifier when discussing schizophrenia because it can occur in a broad spectrum of psychiatric diseases and general medical conditions.
People having catatonia schizophrenia:
- may not respond to stimuli,
- frequently hold bizarre body positions,
- move strangely, and
- exhibit extreme limb rigidity.
3. Disorganized schizophrenia
Disorganized schizophrenia is also referred to as hebephrenic schizophrenia. Delusions and hallucinations are among the symptoms which are characterized by aberrant behavior and incoherent speech. Other symptoms include:
- inappropriate emotional and facial reactions,
- disorganized thinking, and
- difficulty performing daily tasks.
Most individuals with a diagnosis of schizophrenia experience the majority of these symptoms.
4. Residual schizophrenia
Residual schizophrenia can be a little perplexing. The diagnosis was made when a person who had previously been diagnosed with schizophrenia still displayed symptoms like a flattened affect, psychomotor difficulties, and slurred speech but no longer displayed prominent symptoms like delusions and hallucinations.
Experts now recognize that many people with schizophrenia go through phases where the frequency and severity of their symptoms increase and decrease. These lingering symptoms are typical in many situations.
5. Undifferentiated Schizophrenia
People whose symptoms fell under more than one subtype of schizophrenia were diagnosed with undifferentiated schizophrenia. For instance, undifferentiated schizophrenia may have been identified in a patient with cognitive impairments, catatonic behavior, delusions, and hallucinations.
Read More: Emotional And Psychological Trauma: Definition, Symptoms, and Methods.
Takeaway
Though there are various lived experiences of schizophrenia, each of which is prone to different alterations in intensity and symptoms over time, these experiences all fall within a spectrum and should be treated. It is essential for mental health professionals and people with schizophrenia to comprehend and treat the illness as a whole while still individualizing treatment for each patient’s unique set of symptoms.
Now that you know the types of Schizophrenia, know more about the difference between Schizoaffective Disorder and Schizophrenia. To learn more, click here.
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