Is treating schizophrenia with therapy more beneficial than treating it with an antipsychotic medication?

Question

Is treating schizophrenia with cognitive behavioral therapy more beneficial than treating schizophrenia with the atypical antipsychotic risperidone?

Is treating schizophrenia with cognitive behavioral therapy more beneficial than treating schizophrenia with the atypical antipsychotic risperidone? How is it or how is it not?

How is it or how is it not?

Answer 1

Cognitive behavioral therpay does not acknowledge the transpersonal/spiritual nature of schizophrenia and therefore it is questionable just how much it can help. It can help some because I use it myself and I have schizophrenia, but the best help I find comes from a holistic approach that includes spirituality. I have learned through cbt how to stay off the drugs with less distress, the thing is that no therapist has the orientation to provide this service to someone who is psychotic. My psychosis follows the diathesis model of illness in that it was brought on by both stress and biological factors. I took drugs for 17 years and suffered very much from them. I am a lot better with no drugs and learning about therapy on my own as few therapist give any merit to counseling those who have schizophrenia. I went to school for psychology and have a basic understanding of it. It has a long way to go before they can say that they can treat schizophrenia. I found the most help from spiritual sources which have taught me how to end the voices. Now I need to learn how to stop them from coming in the first place. I was on risperdal and it took away some of my personality and made me sleep more than usual. It also made me uncapable of feeling the extreme joy that I felt a lot before I started taking it. There were also other side effects that I care not to mention that broke the camels back. I'll never go back to drugs, but also I don't trust therapists. If anything they will use what they know to have you committed if they have no tolerance or ability to understand you. If it is your first time getting sick, and the symptoms subside on their own, then don't take any drugs. You will only get addicted to them and suffer from rebound effect when you try to go off them which causes psychosis. If you have been taking drugs for a while, then it will be hard to come off of them without relapsing because of the rebound effect, but if you stick with it you can do it, but yuo will hear voices from time to time. If you can find a sympathetic therapist they can help you to cope with hearing voices sometime. Better yet if you find the right information like I did yuo can live happily and productively without drugs and relatively free of voices. Here is a link to an organization that believes in treating with therapy only:

http://www.isps-us.org/

Here is a link to an organization that examines the effectiveness of psychiatry and psychology:

http://www.icspp.org

Answer 2

If a person has schizophrenia, there is something wrong with their brain. It hasn't been figured yet EXACTLY how there is soemthing wrong, but there is no more serious debate that there is something physically wrong. So cognitive behavioral therapy will never treat it. Maybe a person could be less stressed tho, and get support for taking the horrible medicine, tho (lots of side effects). So therapy would help some people. I've met a lot of people who seemed to be unable to benefit much from therapy tho (too spacey, not intelligent enough, do not know they have an illness, that type of thing).

Answer 3

You're joking, right? That's like asking if cognitive behavioral therapy would be more beneficial for treating appendicitis than surgery.

Whether risperidone is the right antipsychotic for an individual or not is a different question. There are atypical APs and first generation ones like Haldol. Which one or combination works best depends on the person. CBT can help with functional and social skills. It's an aid, it's not actual treatment as it would be for someone with personality issues.

If you want to know about various antipsychotics and other psych meds, this is a very good site.
http://www.crazymeds.us

Answer 4

I recently reviewed the research on therapy and schizophrenia. To say it most kindly (on the behalf of therapy) the results are mixed for therapy. There are quite a bit of results for medication. The problem is, as someone else mentioned earlier, within two years it is estimated that up to 70-75% of schizophrenics will stop taking their medications. This is very alarming, since medications have been the only thing that has shown to be beneficial to those with schizophrenia. Most medications work about as effectively as the other, except one-clozapine. The problem is clozapine has such horrible side effects, that it's only reserved for those that failed all other medications.

So, the most important things is medications, and STAYING on medications, no matter how they make you feel.

Answer 5

Rarely. Post Traumatic Stress Disorder usually responds well to the right kind of medication and psychotherapy. Therefore, ECT is a last resort if the medication and therapy have no beneficial effect after awhile. It's rarely used for PTSD.

Answer 6

It's a little of both, but I find medications work better at calming disorders, helping neurologically, assist with hormones or chemical imbalances. Therapy can't fix the physiology of schizophrenia, just the way a person perceives it or reacts to it and not everyone is receptive to doing therapy.

Answer 7

Therapies tend to be of little use, if hallucinations, or delusional states are involved, so it depends on the severity of the disorder, to some extent. See schizophrenia treatments, at http://www.ezy-build.net.nz/~shaneris in section 40: it's not an either/or situation: other treatments are available, but should be tailored to the individual involved.

Answer 8

No. Psychotic disorders such as Schizophrenia are believed to be biological disorders of the brain. Symptoms such as hallucinations, delusions and thought disorders do not respond to CBT or other psychotherapies. Psychotherapies IN ADDITION to medication can often be beneficial to people with Schizophrenia.

Answer 9

It's pretty darn hard to do any type of CBT talk therapy with someone who is psychotic. Just think about it. So medication is pretty much a necessity for someone with schizophrenia. Therapy can be helpful in addition to it.

Answer 10

Schizophrenia is a really tough disorder. Drugs tend to be more effective for it. The best course of action is drugs and therapy, in my opinion.