So the brain apparently shrinks or we lose brain matter (or both) with time but does any of our functioning or ANYTHNG we do or our hallucinations get worse with time?
It seems no?
If so, what does that degenerating brain matter represent?
Is it like a stroke and our brain may do some neuroplasticity rewiring work?
Some people get better, some worse.
@anon90843118
I have the same questions! What impact does losing brain matter have?
Most researchers now agree that it is not degenerative. Some get slightly worse cognitive functioning over time, but about as many get better cognitive functioning. Positive symptoms usually follow a cycling course with remissions in-between. Negative symptoms are, like cognitive functioning, more stable over time.
Schizophrenia can get worse over time but it can also remain the same or even improve.
It all depends.
They say 1 in 5 will get worse, i think it was 3 in 5 will get better within the first five years.
Im guessing when brain matter is lost that the brain continues pretty close to it normally does. But i have no idea, thats actually a really good question, i ought to ask my pdoc next time. Its like how when they use to do brain lobotomy’s but the brain just made the same connections and the person didnt get better.
Alcohol and drugs kill braincells. According to that statement I have no braincells left.
Initial brain abnormalities like enlarged ventricles are associated with worse functioning. Later decreases in brain volume are, if I remember correctly, not related to changes in functioning. It’s important to remember that decreases in brain volume are not synonymous with degeneration, as normal adaptive processes can also lead to decreases in volume.
No. One thing schizophrenia is not, is progressive loss of neurons and neural tissue, as is the case with neurodegenerative disorders like Alzheimer’s or Parkinson’s. Interestingly (sadly), in the days of large state mental hospitals, institutionalized patients with schizophrenia could deteriorate to the point where they appeared to have Alzheimer’s, but there brains still looked normal.
It has been known for some time now that schizophrenia is not a neurodegenerative disorder because MRI spectroscopy studies of a neuronal marker of cell death, N-acetyl-aspertate, do not fit the picture seen in neurodegeneration.
I think it is more likely that the personality can only accommodate the constant onslaught of malignant disturbances it is subject to unabated by the schizophrenia to a certain extent, and ultimately just cannot rebound anymore.
But isn’t there a loss of gray or white matter in schizophrenia and doesn’t that contain neurons and isn’t that neuro degenerative?
Enlarged brain ventricles in this context is the way you define the negative space caused by cerebral atrophy. As the solid gets smaller, the space between the solid gets bigger.
It is a normal part of the aging process like desiccated vertebral discs sometimes called degenerative disc disease. I defer to a geriatrician or a neuro-psychiatrist whether the radiological findings have clinical significance. They may not.
As an aside, there was a previous answer to this question, in a previous thread, which asserted that schizophrenics have dilated ventricles. Unfortunately, that statement was not confirmed by the accompanying cited peer-reviewed article. Rather, the article stated that enlarged ventricles are the most common finding on brain imaging among schizophrenics.
This article does not support the argument that the presence of dilated ventricles is specific for schizophrenia.
I googled this awhile ago and the answer I keep getting is no, it’s not a degenerative disease. Or at the very least there’s no proof that it is. Other than the regression that happens with initial onset of psychosis, there’s no strong evidence that it’s eating away at your brain or getting progressively worse. Lots of people recover at least partially. I’m a lot better off than I used to be, and I prefer to live without the fear that my brain is being eaten.
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