In modern psychiatry, delirium (synonyms: mental disorder, delirium) is a complex of ideas or ideas that have arisen as a result of a developing brain disease as a symptom of a disturbance in thinking. They erroneously reflect reality and are not corrected by new incoming information, regardless of whether the existing conclusion corresponds to reality or not. Most often, delirium is one of the components of the manifestations of schizophrenia or other mental disorders.
In what cases do the words “delirium” have synonyms for “mental disorder” and “insanity”
But in order to talk about the patient’s mental deviation, you can’t start only from the content of the idea that has embraced him. That is, if for others it looks like complete nonsense, this can not serve as evidence of a person’s thinking disorder.
In a delirium, painful is not the content that falls out of generally accepted notions, but the disturbance in the course of a person’s life associated with it. The delusional patient is remote from the world, uncommunicative, he is isolated in his conviction that greatly changes his appearance and life values.
Features of crazy ideas
Delusional conviction does not lend itself to any correction from the outside. Unlike the fallacies of a healthy person who firmly defends his point of view, delirium is a certain unshakable idea that does not require real confirmation, since it exists independently of events that occur in reality. Even the negative experience of following the crazy idea does not make the patient abandon it, and sometimes even, on the contrary, strengthens the belief in its truth.
Since the crazy idea is always very closely connected with the cardinal personality changes that have arisen before, it necessarily causes radical changes in the patient’s attitude towards himself, the outside world, turning him into a “different person”.
Delirium is often accompanied by the so-called psychic automatism syndrome or alienation syndrome, in which the patient has the feeling that any of his actions or thoughts do not occur of their own free will, but are invested or inspired by outsiders. In these cases, patients suffer from delusions of persecution.
Paranoid delirium is the result of distrust of the environment.
Paranoid delirium is formed from opposing oneself to the environment and distrust of other people, transforming over time into extreme suspicion.
At some point, the patient begins to understand that everyone around him is being treated unfairly, infringing on his interests, and humiliating him. Due to the inability of the paranoid to interpret the actions and words of other people, this multi-faceted belief develops into a paranoid syndrome.
In psychiatry, it is divided into three types.
- Delusions of exposure, in which the patient is convinced of the influence externally on his behavior and thoughts.
- Delirium of a relationship, when a person assumes that others are talking about him, laugh at him, look at him.
- Paranoid delirium. This condition is expressed in the patient’s deep conviction that some mysterious forces desire his death or harm him in every way.
By the way, the last type of thinking disorder in certain situations can be easily transmitted to the patient’s environment, which leads to an incident that is characterized as induction, that is, borrowing the beliefs of a sick person healthy.
What is induced delirium
In psychiatry, this phenomenon is called "induced delirium." This is an induced, borrowed belief that the patient takes over from the patient - those who are in close contact with him and have not developed a critical attitude to the patient's pathological condition, since he is an authority in this group or is trusted.
Induced in such cases, they begin to express the same ideas and submit them in the same form as the patient-inducer. A person who induced delirium is, as a rule, an inspired personality who is subordinate or dependent on the source of the idea. Most often, but not always, a dominant person (inducer) is diagnosed with schizophrenia.
It should be noted that this disorder , as well as the initial delirium of the inducer, is a chronic condition, which, according to the plot, turns out to be delirium of greatness, persecution or religious delirium. Mostly, groups that find themselves in cultural, linguistic or territorial isolation fall under the indicated influence.
Under what conditions can I make a diagnosis
In order to correctly diagnose, it should be remembered that the induced delirium is:
- a condition in which several people share the same crazy idea or a system built on it;
- support each other in the named conviction;
- such people have a very close relationship;
- even passive members of this group are induced after contact with active partners.
Upon termination of contact with the inductor, the views so grafted are most often scattered without a trace.
How does hypochondria delirium occur?
In psychiatric practice, another kind of thinking disorder is often found - hypochondriacal delirium. This condition is characterized by a deep conviction of the patient that he has a serious incurable disease or a shameful one that does not lend itself to conventional therapy.
The fact that doctors cannot find it, a person struck by delirium perceives only as their incompetence or indifference. The data of analyzes and examinations for such patients are not evidence, because they have a deep belief in their own unique ailment. The patient is seeking more and more examinations.
If hypochondriacal delirium begins to grow, then the idea of persecution, which the doctors allegedly organized in relation to the patient, also joins him. These symptoms are often supplemented by the previously mentioned nonsense of exposure, which is supported by the belief that the disease is caused by specially organized radiation, which destroys the internal organs and even the brain.
How does a change in hypochondriac delirium occur?
Sometimes in patients with hypochondriacal delusions there is a change in it to the idea of the opposite content - that the patient was always absolutely healthy or, most often, that he suddenly was completely healed. As a rule, such nonsense is a consequence of a change in mood caused by the disappearance of (usually superficial) depression and the appearance of a hypomanic state.
That is, the patient as he was, and remained fixed on the topic of health, but now his delirium changes the vector and, becoming a delirium of health, is sent to heal others.
By the way, many so-called traditional healers who disseminate personally invented methods of curing all ailments have a described category of thinking disorder. In the best case, such methods are simply harmless, but this is quite rare!
How nonsense becomes systematized
Interestingly, delusional constructions in all the above cases are interconnected, consistent and have some kind of logical explanation. Such a disorder of thinking indicates that we have a systematic delirium.
This disorder is most often seen in people with a good level of intelligence. The structure of systematic delirium includes material on the basis of which the idea is built, as well as a plot - the design of this idea. With the development of the disease, it can be stained, saturated with new details and even change direction, as shown above.
By the way, the presence of systematic delirium always confirms its long existence, since an acute onset of the disease, as a rule, does not have a harmonious system.