K-PAX

Psychotic/Psychosis• Means a person cannot tell the difference between what is

real and what is imagined

• He/she has lost touch with reality

Delusional Disorder• A type of psychosis in which a person holds unshakable

beliefs in something untrue

• For example they may believe they are being followed, poisoned, deceived, conspired against, or loved from a distance

• The delusions usually involve the misinterpretation of experiences, however the situations are either not true at all or are highly exaggerated

• Delusions must last for at least one month.

• Apart from the impact of the delusions, persons functioning is not dramatically impaired and their behavior is not obviously odd or bizarre.

• Person is still able to socialize and function normally

• Delusions are not due to the direct physical affects of a substance (drug abuse, medication, etc…) or a general medical condition.

• Is not schizophrenia (which usually includes hallucinations).

Types of Delusions• Delusions of persecution• The belief that someone the person is close to is

treating them unfairly or is out to get them.

• Delusions of being controlled• The belief that your thoughts are being controlled by

someone or something else (the government, aliens)

• Delusions of grandeur• A belief in ones own power, knowledge, inflated

worth, or that they have a special relationship to God or some famous person.

Thorazine• Type of drug used to treat psychotic symptoms of

schizophrenia.

• Has some negative side effects including: twitching, uncontrollable shaking, and problems with walking or balance.

Catatonic• A state of physical or psychological immobility

• Person is awake, but shows no reaction to outside world at all

Hypnosis• A social interaction in which a hypnotist makes suggestions

about perceptions, feelings, thoughts, or behaviors and a subject follows those suggestions.

Hypnotic Regression• A type of hypnosis used to recover what practitioners believe

are memories from your past, your early childhood, and even past lives.

Psychogenic Fugue

• Also called a fugue state

• A rare psychiatric disorder characterized by amnesia (loss of memory) for personal identity, including the memories, personality, and other identifying characteristics of an individual

• It usually involves unplanned traveling, or wandering, and even establishing a completely new identity someplace else.

• It is not a fugue if it results from drug use, physical trauma (brain injury) or some other medical condition

• Usually triggered by a stressful episode

• After recovery from fugue, previous memories usually return, but there is complete amnesia for the fugue episode

PTSD• Post traumatic stress disorder

• A severe anxiety disorder that can develop after exposure to an event that results in psychological trauma

• May involve death or the threat of it to ones self or someone close to the person

• Can be caused by natural disasters, accidents, military combat, or physical or sexual abuse.

• Person’s ability to cope becomes overwhelmed

• Person with PTSD re-experiences the original trauma through flashbacks or nightmares.

• Person will often avoid stimuli associated with the trauma which may trigger an episode (i.e. fireworks that sound like gunshots).