The presence of affective components in schizophrenia suggests the existence of an entity called schizoaffective disorder — a diagnosis with some controversy because it is possible that “schizoaffective disorders” are merely affective disorders with psychotic features.5 Indeed, one study compared data from outpatients with a diagnosis of schizophrenia or schizoaffective disorder with that of control participants not undergoing psychiatric treatment and found that schizophrenia and schizoaffective disorder were “largely indistinguishable on key cognitive, social cognitive and neural measures.”6
Yes I agree with the latter. But I always thought I was schizophrenic with mood components, being sza.
The sz definitely dominated my life more than mood issues. I was crrrrazy mayne. Not just bad moods with a “psychotic aspect”. Loss of touch of reality and insight and reason and self dominated my life.
But it seems that paragraph comes full circle to say, sza IS indeed a distinct disorder. And not just a highly psychotic person who has a mood disorder or vice verse or whatever.
Good article thanks
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I’d read many years ago that sza-depressive was nearer to sz ,while sza-bipolar was nearer to bipolar disorder.
I’m diagnosed with bipolar disorder and my psychotic episodes are no longer based on grandiosity.
They are filled with paranoid delusions.
Makes me wonder.
Before being switched to a pd dx I was dxed sza-mixed . My current pdoc has me back as sza because of a history of phases of high and low mood in the context of concurrently having psychotic symptoms .
It ages since I’ve felt particularly high though. It could be Consta and Paliperidone work better at the high end rather than the low end of a person’s mood .
Maybe mescaline caused the grandeur. Maybe I’m bipolar. And lsd caused the paranoia. And the bipolar caused the grandeur. I dunno my bad trip was that everyone was out to get to me. So it caught a similar theme in my life going forward. But truly I may be bi polar with poly substance abuse. My pdoc said yearssss ago I was bipolar and drugs made me sza. But I was probably ptsd too before if that’s all true with psychotic components to both. But I didn’t think he knew what he was saying. I heard voices before I ever did any drug or alcohol. Sooo In the end we all know it doesn’t really matter. We’ve all made mistakes. We all have issues. We also all wanna be the best we can be. And the chemistry of the brain meeting the environment and substances and meds added too is so complicated and difficult to forecast what’s right for one and what’s the diagnosis for another. Imo. Hopefully one day we figure this all out. For now it’s baby steps
One pdoc looks at the notes and decides personality disorder instead of sza mixed . 13 years later another pdoc sees me and says sz and autism more likely . He then looks at the notes and says schizoaffective is the right dx(along with ASD) .
That suggests there’s a lot of subjectivity involved in assigning a label to a person .
I have little doubt they’d diagnose me probably bipolar now. I’ve always been sza except once I was sz and once bipolar. But now stable on meds I may be too functional to a fresh point of view to not be “demoted” to bipolar. I asked my pdoc a year ago about me being bipolar. He was very adamant about sza still. But hey things change 
No more subtypes of sz ?
One of my case workers told me a few weeks ago not to believe anything on Wikipedia or on the internet. She said I should ask my pdoc.
So I really don’t know what to believe.
In the past, there were different subtypes of schizophrenia, including:
- paranoid schizophrenia
- disorganized, or hebephrenic schizophrenia
- catatonic schizophrenia
- childhood schizophrenia
- schizoaffective disorder
**In 2013 the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders 5th edition (DSM-V) changed the method of classification to bring all these categories under a single heading: schizophrenia.
**https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/192770.php