A problem of the diagnosis of schizophrenia known as co-morbidity this is when the symptoms of schizophrenia overlap with many other disorders, such as, depression and bipolar disorder. This is a problem because the patient may be misdiagnosed and given the wrong type of treatment which will not cure the symptoms they have and may cause another type of illness. This can be solved by multiple diagnosis this will also improve the inter rater reliability. Reliability is the extent in to which two or more medical specialists have consistent results in their diagnosis. The validity externally is very difficult as there are cultural barriers, as psychiatrists from different cultures interpret symptoms differently resulting in people being diagnosed schizophrenia in one culture but not in another.
This allows the results to be generalised. Weaknesses The hospital staff was deceived - this is, of course, unethical. Although Rosenhan did conceal the names of hospitals or staff and attempted to eliminate any clues which might lead to their identification. Rosenhan did note that the experiences of the pseudo-patients could have differed from that of real patients who did not have the comfort of knowing that the diagnosis was false. Perhaps Rosenhan was being too hard on psychiatric hospitals, especially when it is important for them to play safe in their diagnosis of abnormality because there is always an outcry when a patient is let out of psychiatric care and gets into trouble.
Discuss the concepts of normality and abnormality and briefly explain the classification systems for mental health Abnormality is an issue in the realm of individual differences and it refers to behaviours and psychological functioning that are quite different from normal. However, there is not a clear line between Normal and Abnormal people; in some occasions a normal person might perform abnormal behaviours whereas an abnormal person might perform normal behaviours. Also a normal behaviour in one situation may be considered as an abnormal behaviour in another situation, for example, some behaviours in a party are not suitable at a funeral. It is important to consider culture factor to define abnormality. Culture includes social norms, attitudes, values and beliefs which are learned and shared by people who are members of a particular society.
There are many issues when it comes to the classification and diagnosis of schizophrenia, one of them being the reliability of the major classification systems, the DSM and ICD. Early versions of the DSM were deemed unreliable, even now when the newer versions are now said to have increased reliability there is little evidence to prove that the DSM is used with high reliability by mental health clinicians. This unreliable source of diagnosis may cause some patients to be misdiagnosed and due to this misdiagnosis many terrible situations may occur, they will be mistreated and therefore will be given drugs and exercises which are completely irrelevant to what they need to do, this could cause great harm to both their physical and mental well being, the misdiagnosis can also affect how they are in real life for example they will be labelled schizophrenic and therefore will struggle with everything in life, such as getting a job or even being themselves for they believe what they have been told to be true. There is also an issue with the treatment of schizophrenia due to the significant difficulty in predicting the outcome or the response, because every case of schizophrenia is different in their own way then there is no telling what the same treatment will do to one patient in comparison with another this uncertainty clearly points out a huge point at which the diagnosis of schizophrenia is just too vague, there are many sub types and for this how can all of them be put under the same title for the same treatment... Schizophrenia is a term which is somewhat thrown around, especially by the media, misleading the general population into thinking it is a mental disorder which you should be scared of due to the delusions and hallucinations which we have been told occur all the time, this in fact is not completely true as there are many subtypes of schizophrenia, some
Issues of reliability and validity in the diagnosis of depression Depression is most commonly diagnosed using the DSM which consists of nine criteria. If a patient fits with at least 5 of the criteria they are diagnosed with having major depressive disorder. When diagnosing depression it is important to check validity and reliability as otherwise a false diagnosis may occur, or someone with depression would in fact be untreated. The reliability of the DSM however has been questioned. Zimmerman et al suggests that is an unnecessary lengthy scale, therefore giving an unreliable diagnosis.
This study also briefly discusses the connection between the disease and “Mad Cow Disease”. Furthermore, an overview of the disease’s basic symptoms, causes, diagnosis, and prognosis are illustrated through the examination of various psychological articles. Some of these also present interesting research projects which detail the disease’s infectivity and survivability. Finally, the data collected by all the sources and the two case studies further leads to the conclusion that without enough data over this rare disease it will be difficult to understand and combat it. Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease: An Assessment of the Complex, Unknown Disease Human beings are products of their own memories.
On Being Sane In Insane Places David L. Rosenhan∗ How do we know precisely what constitutes “normality” or mental illness? Conventional wisdom suggests that specially trained professionals have the ability to make reasonably accurate diagnoses. In this research, however, David Rosenhan provides evidence to challenge this assumption. What is -- or is not -- “normal” may have much to do with the labels that are applied to people in particular settings. If sanity and insanity exist, how shall we know them?
Case studies allow for observations of unusual problems and allow for new techniques for therapy to be created. Disadvantages: It is said that biased observers record case studies and that they rely on subjective evidence (Axia College, 2003). Case studies do not fix everyone's problems. They do show a record of what a treatment worked on one patient, but this does not mean the same treatment will work on the next patient. Correlational Method: Advantages: This type of method is used to look for relationships between variables with three different possible results, a negative correlation, a positive correlation, or no correlation.
Predicting Dangerousness When judging whether a patient is a danger to themselves the mental health professionals are often called on. They are also asked as part of the legal proceedings to determine whether people should be involuntarily hospitalized or maintained involuntarily in a mental facility. The accuracy of the judgments made by these professionals on predicting the dangerousness of these people is in question. The mental health professionals are not very accurate when it comes to predicting the dangerousness of the people they treat. They are more likely to over predict, in some cases people may be labeled as dangerous when they are not.
Family, twin and adoption studies must be considered cautiously because they are retrospective, and diagnosis may be biased by knowledge that other family members who may have been diagnosed, suggesting there may be problems of demand characteristics. A second weakness is the problem of nature-v-Nurture. It is difficult to separate the influence of nature-v-nurture. The fact that the concordance rates are not 100% means that schizophrenia cannot wholly be explained by genes and it could be that individuals have a pre-disposition to schizophrenia. This suggests that the biological account cannot give a full explanation of the disorder.