Should the term ‘schizophrenia’ be abolished?
Experts believe the term schizophrenia should be abolished. Apparently the category “falsely groups a wide range of symptoms and encourages over-reliance on anti-psychotic drugs rather than psychological intervention”.
Paul Hammersley, who is involved with the Campaign to Abolish the Schizophrenia Label (Castle) said “It is associated with violence, dangerousness, unpredictability, inability to recover, constant illness, constant need for medication and an inability to work. I cannot emphasise enough how stigmatising this label is.”
It is estimated that 1 in every 100 person will develop schizophrenia at some point in their life. Marjorie Wallace, chief executive of SANE, said “While we recognise that the term ‘schizophrenia’ can act as a stigmatising label, without identifying this condition as a serious illness how can there be any hope of researching it and providing better treatments? Simply replacing the term with another is unlikely to add to our understanding of this complex condition.”