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Antipsychotic medications are used for the treatment of psychoses and delusions, and sometimes as a sedative. Psychosis is a psychiatric classification for a mental state in which the perception of reality is distorted. Persons experiencing a psychotic episode may experience hallucinations (often auditory or visual hallucinations), hold paranoid or delusional beliefs and exhibit disorganized thinking. This is often accompanied by a lack of insight into the unusual or bizarre nature of their behaviour. Psychosis is one of the symptoms of severe mental illness such as schizophrenia and bipolar disorder (manic depression). It may also occur in severe cases of depression, brain injury, drug overdose or unusual negative reaction to drugs (particularly amphetamines and hallucinogenic drugs such as LSD or mescaline), or extreme personal stress. Psychosis triggered by stress in the absence of any other mental illness is known as brief reactive psychosis. The term psychosis should be distinguished from the concept of insanity, which is a legal term denoting that a person should not be criminally responsible for his actions. It should be distinguished from the state of delirium, in that a psychotic individual may be able to perform actions that require a high level of intellectual effort. Finally, it should be distinguished from mental illness. Persons with schizophrenia can have long periods without psychosis and persons with bipolar disorder and depression can have mood symptoms without psychosis. Conversely, psychosis can occur in persons without mental illness as a result of drug overdose or extreme stress. Etymology: The word psychosis comes from the Greek psykhe (mind) and osis (diseased or abnormal condition). It is believed the word was first coined in 1846 and is derived from the term neurosis. |
