Facts About Schizophrenia In Kids

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Schizophrenia is a persistent psychiatric disease. If your kid is suffering from this chronic disease, it can deform the thinking capacity of your child, which can result in various hallucinations and delusions.

However, you will be surprised and happy to know that these are the positive signs. Sadly, when there are positive signs, you have to be ready for the negative ones too. Social isolation, emotionless and violent behavior are a few negative symptoms of Child Schizophrenia.

Schizophrenia is a very rare condition in children and it is extremely difficult to identify the symptoms in the early phases of the disease. The reason is, children are still maturing both physically and mentally.

In the early childhood days, your kid may start thinking that somebody is trying to control his/her beliefs or someone might be guessing what he/she is thinking.

In the school, your child may throw tantrums with an aggressive behavior, which his/her teacher might think as a behavioural issue. All these symptoms are part of suspicious illusions caused by this horrible disease.

Causes Of Child Schizophrenia
According to the researchers, Schizophrenia happens in children the same way it stems in the adults.

However, studies are still going on to find out why some individuals get it so early, while others don't. There cannot be a single cause of Schizophrenia; it is a very difficult interaction between the environment and genetics of your children.

1) Genetics: Genetics plays a very important role in the development of Schizophrenia in children. If you have a schizophrenic sibling or a parent, then you have 10% likelihood to get Schizophrenia. Now again, it is not necessary that if you have Schizophrenia, your child will also have it. So, the genetics can be a cause of Schizophrenia, but it can't determine the illness.

2) Brain Structure: If your child has an abnormal brain structure, he/she is likely to have Schizophrenia. This can also be one of the causes of the disease.

3) Environment: Sometimes environmental factors can also play an important role for causing this chronic psychiatric disease. According to a few researches, it was found that pregnant women with high stress levels can lead to Schizophrenia in their offsprings. Some other environmental situations that trigger Schizophrenia are viral infection in the womb, loss of a parent in childhood, child physical abuse, the child inflicted with viral infection as a baby, low oxygen level during labor and delivery.

Symptoms Of Schizophrenia
The symptoms of Schizophrenia usually begin in the mid-twenties to late twenties. The early symptoms can be seen even before 18 years of age. Symptoms may differ in nature and severity with the passage of time. They can deteriorate and sometimes, they may also lessen with time.

1) Early Symptoms: These include developmental issues like late crawling, delay in talking, arm flapping, rocking, delay in walking, etc.

2) Teenage Symptoms: A decline in school performance, trouble in sleeping, weird behaviour, depression, bad temper, feeling de-motivated, etc.

3) Late Symptoms: As the kids suffering from the disease grow older, they start showing more typical symptoms of the disease. Hallucinations, negative signs, delusions, disorganized behaviour, weird postures, excessive movements, irresponsiveness, etc., are some symptoms that appear later in the grown-up kids.

When Should You Consult A Doctor?

You must talk to a doctor if your kid shows weird eating habits, doesn't socialize, is paranoid, is lagging behind in educational performance, has strange fears and bizarre ideas, takes the dreams as reality or has a very aggressive nature.

If you see these symptoms in your child, you must seek out medical advice and medical care as soon as possible. If this serious disease is left untreated in childhood, it can lead to severe behavioural, emotional and a myriad of other health issues.