Delusions are characterized as an unshakable belief in things that are not true, and often there is a continued belief in the delusion despite contrary evidence.
Why Delusions??
These delusions may appears due to a variety of genetic, biological, psychological, and environmental causes.Delusion may be symptoms of health problem or any brain disorder.
It may occur due to imbalance in neurotransmitters.Neurotransmitters are of two types some are excitatory neurotransmitter like Glutamate,Ach,Nor adrenaline ,Serotonin,Dopamine and some are inhibitory neurotransmitter like GABA.
Types of Delusion:-
•Delusion of Grandiose- Person feels and have strong belief that he is the most powerful man in respect of wealth,power, knowledge,identity.Like- Patient strongly believes that he is the king of his kingdom and no one is more powerful than him so he start behaving in the same manner
•Somatic Delusion- Soma means body, so in this condition person start believing that he is having some physical defect or any medical problem,even if he is completely fine but he feels like as he is not having his one hand.
•Delusion of Erotomania- In this condition person start believing that the other person (usually someone who is very famous) is in love with him.So he start expressing his love,he start stalking them and start assuming that the other person is replying as well.
•Delusion of Jealousy- In this condition person believes that their sexual partner is being unfaithful without having any real proof or he have abnormal behaviour related to these thoughts.
•Delusion of Persecution- The person believes the family member or the people close to him are planning to harm him.They firmly believe this is true,despite the lack of proof.
•Mixed- When person have more than one type of delusion at a time then it is known to be mixed type of delusion.
Basic Treatment??
The treatment for delusions greatly varies i.e we have to first identify the basic cause that is it due to any stress condition ? or is it due to any brain injury ? Is it due to disturbances in neurotransmitter? If so then which neurotransmitter are disturbed ?
Because the CNS drugs are wide in range and there are lot of drugs which acts differently so before rushing to the treatment we have to first make it clear that the delusion is due to which type of disturbances in neurotransmitter. Then after this accordingly we will use drugs and if the delusions are due to any other disease i.e are secondary delusions then we have to treat that basic disease and the delusion will be managed.
We will be talking about CNS Depressants drugs like,
Drugs used for Anxiety are- Anxiolytic drugs (Sedatives)
Drugs used for Insomnia – Hypnotics
Drugs for Depression – Anti Depressants
Drugs for Epilepsy- Anti epileptics
Drugs for psychosis- Anti psychotics
And after reading about these drugs you will be able to figure out that the whole treatment resolves around balancing the level of neurotransmitters.
Contributor- Medico Anant Singh Nanda
