of positive symptoms vs. impaired life functioning
•Medication compliance vs. noncompliance
•Reasons for inconsistencies with treatment
•Interventions for continuity of care
•Symptom driven impulsive (dangerous) behavior
•Command hallucinations
•Risk for suicide / homicide
•Cognitive remediation and scaffolding
•Disability management
Princeton
•Psychiatric rehabilitation
•Rehabilitation readiness determination
•Skill development
•Smoking prevalence, cessation and health risk to people with schizophrenia
•Physical Illness and schizophrenia
Goodbye, Old Friends
•Cognitive remediation and errorless learning
A Nobel Prize
•More disability management techniques
•Recovery from schizophrenia is not unique
Continuing Education Information
For information about Continuing Education credit for watching the movie A BEAUTIFUL MIND and using this e-book as your guide visit:
Learning Objectives
This e-book is designed to be used as a companion to the Universal Studios film, A BEAUTIFUL MIND. It presents a unique and entertaining learning opportunity for both mental health professionals and those who are not trained in mental health. It brings the diagnosis of schizophrenia to life with its scene-by-scene information about the movie. For mental health professionals it serves as an entertaining up-to-date refresher course with a chance to earn continuing education credits. For non-mental health professionals it allows the movie to be an entertaining vehicle that educates readers to recognize and understand schizophrenia; know the potential risks to individuals, their families, friends, co-workers and fellow students if the illness is untreated; and to know about options for a safe and productive life for individuals with the illness. The e-book discusses diagnostic symptoms; acute and long term pharmacological treatment; rehabilitation; and disability management for the social, vocational and educational impairments from the illness to individuals with schizophrenia. The movie portrays a textbook example of the illness and is valuable for learning. It should be emphasized that the “Hollywood effect” may tend to over/under exaggerate the symptoms and behaviors experienced by many individuals with this disorder.
The e-book will explain:
•positive and negative symptoms of schizophrenia
•DSM-IV-TR diagnostic criteria for schizophrenia
•DSM-IV multi-axial diagnosis
•mental status
•1st and 2nd generation antipsychotic medications
•the CATIE (Clinical Antipsychotic Trials of Intervention Effectiveness study) findings
•multi-element programs
•psychiatric rehabilitation, family intervention, disability management
•cognitive remediation
•functional impact of schizophrenia
•schizophrenia and physical illness
•consumer perspectives
Schizophrenia
With the movie, “A Beautiful Mind,” Ron Howard and Universal Studios provide an opportunity to learn about the illness, schizophrenia, a disease of the brain that impairs an individual’s perceptions, concentration, and social interaction and, thus, can be quite disabling. It is characterized by a person’s perception of reality which can be very different from the way most other people perceive the same reality. This guide will assist the reader, while viewing the movie, in learning about this illness and its effect on people who have it, their families and their friends. To make the best use of this guide:
1.VIEW THE FILM IN ITS ENTIRETY, then
2.READ THE GUIDE, SECTION BY SECTION, AS YOU REVIEW THE CORRESPONDING SCENE FROM THE FILM.
The power of this movie is that it is written and filmed from the perspective of a person with schizophrenia as well as from the perspective of others. Thus, it presents not only what is observed about John externally through society’s reality; it also demonstrates what drives John internally through his unique reality. It demonstrates how an action or behavior of a person with schizophrenia can appear to be bizarre to an observer while appearing so appropriate to the person experiencing it.
Mathematicians
The film opens in September, 1947, as the Chairperson of Princeton University’s mathematics department, Professor Helinger, welcomes the incoming class of mathematicians. Although the significant players are not formally introduced, non-verbal behavior introduces the two who stand out from the group. One demonstrates a feeling of superiority by leaning on the edge of the table with his back to many of the students who are seated on chairs around the table. The other demonstrates a feeling of uneasiness by placing himself behind the entire group, somewhat like an outsider, his hands fidgeting and his eyes mostly fixed the floor. Both students demonstrate a keen awareness of each other.
As John Nash, the person who positioned himself behind the group, and some of the other major players are introduced, it is learned that John is one of the two recipients of a prestigious prize, the Carnegie Scholarship. John is described as a “mysterious genius” by his major competitor, Martin Hansen, the other recipient of the Carnegie Scholarship. Martin’s information infers that John’s behaviors have, in fact, been noted to be strange, peculiar and perhaps, mystifying. Martin’s does not infer that these behaviors are due to a mental illness.
Martin’s inferences are a reminder of the long delays that occur in the diagnosis and treatment of people with schizophrenia, due to various reasons like, patients and family members may not recognize subtle symptoms while abnormal thoughts and behaviors may be attributed to substance abuse, stress or other factors. Stigma, lack of health insurance, or other barriers to accessing medical care may also play a role…Whatever the reasons, the duration of untreated psychosis is thought not only to predict initial treatment response in patients with schizophrenia, but may also affect long-term outcomes. More specifically, it has been found that the less time psychosis goes untreated, the more likely it is that antipsychotics would produce a response, including relief from positive symptoms like hallucinations and negative symptoms like social withdrawal, which will be discussed in
