Mental Health and Disease
Published on Dec 29, 2018 and last reviewed on Feb 02, 2023 - 2 min read
Abstract
Mental health is as important as physical health. a sound body has sound mind and vice versa. there are some common mental health problems and some are serious problems
Mental health
As per the World Health Organization, health is the state of complete mental, physical, social and spiritual well-being, and not merely the absence of illness.
Mental health is the health of our mind. The mind is an organ of our body just like the heart, liver, kidney, etc. We may also say that mental health is a state of emotional, psychological and social well-being.
It defines how we think, feel, and behave, how we handle stress, relate to others, and make decisions in our day to day life.
Mental health is as important as your physical health. It has a direct influence on your physical health. If you are not feeling emotionally and psychologically normal, you would not feel like eating, showering, going to the gym or for a walk, and that would ultimately affect your body.
Similarly, when you have a bodily problem like fever or jaundice, you feel irritated and distressed. Hence, your mind would not be at ease. So, for completehealth, both mental and physical well-being is essential.
What Affects Our Mental Health?
Many factors contribute to mental health problems:
- The external environment, stress, life events.
- Biological factors, such as genes or brain chemistry.
- Some hormonal issues like thyroid.
- Family history of mental health problems.
What Are the Most Common Mental Illnesses?
- Depression.
- Anxiety disorders like social anxiety, specific phobias, obsessive-compulsive disorders, panic attacks, post-traumatic stress disorder.
- Schizophrenia.
- Bipolar disorder.
Why Mental Illness Occurs?
Due to an imbalance of certain chemicals in our brain like serotonin, dopamine, etc.
These chemicals regulate our mood, behavior, and thought process.
When and How to Seek Help?
When you feel there is a change in your mood, behavior, thought process, sleep pattern, appetite, academic performance or work performance, it indicates that there may be some problem with your mental health.
Signs of Mental Illnesses
1. Depression
- Low mood on most days of the week.
- Inability to enjoy previously pleasurable activities.
- Easy fatiguability.
- Thoughts of worthlessness, hopelessness, helplessness, self-blame, guilt, pessimism.
- Death wishes, suicidal acts.
- Disturbed sleep and appetite.
2. Anxiety Disorders
In all types of anxiety disorders, anxiety is the integral feeling along with palpitations, panic, restlessness, difficulty in breathing, chest tightness, and irritability.
Some symptoms are specific to particular disorders:
- OCD: obsessions and compulsions like doubts of contamination, repeated hand washing, checking things.
- Panic attack: extreme anxiety with a feeling of impending doom.
- Social anxiety: difficulty in facing social situations.
3. Schizophrenia
- Delusions: fixed, firm and unshakable beliefs that people are after me, want to harm me, talk ill about me.
- Auditory hallucinations: hearing voices
- Fearfulness, irritability, disturbed sleep and appetite, significant disturbance of day to day functioning.
4. Bipolar Disorder
Episodes of both depression and mania occur.
- Depression phase shows features just as mentioned above in regular depression.
- In the mania phase, the person has elated mood or irritability, talks big things, self-confidence increases, and always feels energetic despite taking no rest.
What to Do If Someone Has These Symptoms
Do not ignore the problem. Consult a mental health professional, intervention on time is very essential.
Treatment options include:
- Medicines.
- Psychotherapy/counseling.
- Biofeedback.
- Repeated transcranial magnetic stimulation.
Frequently Asked Questions
1.
What Are the Types of Mental Disorders?
The types of mental disorders are:
- Anxiety disorders like obsessive-compulsive disorder, panic disorders, and phobia.
- Bipolar disorders, depression, and other mood disorders.
- Personality disorders.
- Eating disorders.
- Post-traumatic stress disorders.
- Psychotic disorders, including schizophrenia
2.
What Could Trigger Mental Illnesses?
The factors that could trigger the mental illness are:
- Childhood trauma, abuse, or disease.
- Social isolation or loneliness.
- Social disadvantage, debt, or poverty.
- Losing someone close to you.
- Long-term or severe stress.
- The long-term physical health condition.
- Losing a job or unemployment.
- Undergoing discrimination or stigma.
3.
Can Mental Disease Be Healed Permanently?
Most mental illnesses cannot be cured, but it can be managed by minimizing the symptoms by treating them to engage in daily activities like job, school, and social environment.
4.
What Could Be the Best Treatment for Mental Illness?
Psychiatric medications can help to perform the treatment like psychotherapy effectively. The best medicine depends on a particular situation and how the body reacts to the drug. The most commonly used psychiatric medications are antidepressants.
5.
How to Treat Mental Illness Without Medication?
The methods of treating mental illness without medication are:
- Brain stimulation techniques like Transcranial magnetic stimulation uses electric current and magnetic fields to recalibrate the brain chemistry is a safe and non-invasive technique.
- The other alternative methods are biofeedback, neurofeedback, and eye movement desensitization reprocessing.
- Holistic treatment like acupuncture, massage therapy, fitness, nutrition, meditation, and yoga.
6.
Can You Live an Ordinary Life With a Mental Illness?
Individuals with mental illness can have a completely normal life. No one wants to live with the shame associated with mental illness. We have to remember the important thing as a society is to be compassionate, more caring, more informed, and more supportive of people with mental illness.
7.
How Can I Know if I Am Bipolar?
You can know that you have the bipolar disorder if you have the following symptoms:
- Feeling overly happy for an extended period.
- Talking very fast, often with rapid thoughts.
- Feeling too restless or hasty.
- Easily distracted.
- Decreased need for sleep.
8.
What Are the Strange Forms of Mental Illnesses?
The strange forms of mental illnesses are:
- Alice in wonderland.
- Alien hand syndrome.
- Lima syndrome.
- Synesthesia.
- Paris syndrome.
- Thought insertion.
- Boanthropy.
- Capgras delusion.
- Cotard’s syndrome.
- Folie a deux.
9.
What Are The Examples of Psychotic Disorders?
The examples of psychotic disorders are:
- Schizophrenia is the most common psychotic disorder.
- Schizophreniform Disorder.
- Schizoaffective Disorder.
- Delusional Disorder.
- Paraphrenia.
- Brief Psychotic Disorder.
- Psychotic Disorder Due to a Medical Condition.
- Substance-Induced Psychotic Disorder.
10.
Which Is the Most Frequently Occurring Psychotic Disorder?
The most frequently occurring psychotic disorder is schizophrenia. This causes delusion, behavior changes, and hallucinations, lasting for about six months or more and affecting work, school, and social relationships.
Last reviewed at:
02 Feb 2023 - 2 min read
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