Negative symptoms of schizophrenia

Simply mental health is a channel for short videos on mental disorders and the symptoms of mental disorder. Dr Vijay Bhatia has been working in mental health for last 30 years and has experience in diagnosing and treating mental health disorders. These videos are designed to understand mental illness and identify symptoms in mental disorders. Negative symptoms of schizophrenia include Affective blunting, Alogia, Anhedonia, Avolition, lack of spontaneity, poor rapport, asociality. Also included cognitive symptoms in schizophrenia. Apathy and stereotyped behaviors. Alogia – dysfunction of communication; restriction in the fluency and productivity of thought and speech. Affective blunting or flattening – restrictions in the range and intensity of emotional expression. Asociality – reduced social drive and interaction. Anhedonia – reduced ability to experience pleasure. Avolition – reduced desire, motivation or persistence; restrictions in the initiation of goal-directed behaviour. Negative symptoms are not just part of the syndrome Schizophrenia – they can also be part of a “Prodrome” that begins with subsyndromal symptoms that do not meet the diagnosis criteria of schizophrenia and occur before the onset of the full syndrome of schizophrenia.
Prodromal negative symptoms are important to detect and monitor overtime in high risk patients so that treatment can be initiated at the first signs of psychosis.
Negative symptoms can also persist between psychotic episodes once schizophrenia has begun, and reduce social and occupational functioning in the absence of positive symptoms. Autism
Post stroke (Vascular or multi-infarct) dementia, Alzheimer’s disease and many other organic dementias such as Parkinsonian/Lewy body dementia, Frontotemporal/Pick’s dementia. Depressed mood, anxious mood, guilt, tension, irritability and worry frequently accompany schizophrenia.
These are also present in major depressive disorder, psychotic depression, bipolar disorder, schizoaffective disorder, organic dementias, childhood psychotic disorders, and treatment resistant cases of depression, bipolar disorder, and schizophrenia, among others.