Biology

Schizophrenia

The term "schizophrenia" is badly interpreted; because it is believed that affected people have a "double personality".

Schizophrenia is a chronic, severe and disabling brain disorder. Many times, people with the disorder hear voices others do not hear or think others can read your mind, controlling their thoughts or conspiring to harm them. This can make fearful people.

Causes: The origin of schizophrenia is not known with certainty,

·         Early brain development disorders.

·         Genetic predisposition by relatives.

·         Alteration of certain substances such as neurotransmitters

·         Infections of pregnancy and delivery complications by maternal virus

The organs affected by it: it affects the brain and mostly the hypothalamus

Symptoms:

People with schizophrenia may talk nonsense and can sit for hours without moving or talking.

The symptoms of schizophrenia are classified into three main categories: positive symptoms, negative symptoms and cognitive symptoms.

·         Positive symptoms are behaviors not seen in healthy people. People with positive symptoms "lose touch" with reality. These symptoms may come and go, sometimes are intense and sometimes you don’t feel them.

Positive symptoms include:

ü  Hallucinations:  These are things that a person can see, hear, smell or feel that no one elsenotice. The "voices" are the most common type of hallucination associated with schizophrenia. These voices talk about their behavior and order them to do something or warn them of danger. People with schizophrenia hear voices before your family or friends noticing.

ü  Delusions: they believe that friends can control their behavior with magnetic waves.

ü  Disorganized thinking

ü  Movement disorders: the person can move a lot, or not move for hours, as I said before.

·         Negative symptoms are harder to recognize as part of this disorder, because it is often confused with depression or other conditions. These symptoms include:

ü  Lack of satisfaction in daily life.

ü  Lack of communication.

ü  Often the lack of personal hygiene makes them look lazy people or people who do not want to get ahead, but they are symptoms of schizophrenia.

·         Cognitive symptoms: Like negative symptoms, these symptoms are difficult to recognize as part of this disorder. They’re often detected when testing for other reasons takes place.

ü  Trouble concentrating or paying attention.

ü  Problems with "working memory".

The treatment we should follow:  Nowadays it is mainly treated schizophrenia with certain drugs, called narcoleptics or antipsychotics.

How we can prevent it: Social and psychological factors such as stress, trauma and stressful events may also contribute to the onset of the disease.

Schizophrenia affects men and women. Symptoms usually begin between 16 and 30 years. It is hard to diagnose schizophrenia in an adolescent, because the first signs may include: change in friends, fall in ratings trouble sleeping, ...

Are people with schizophrenia violent?

Generally, people with schizophrenia are not violent. In fact, substance abuse can cause a person to become violent.

Schizophrenia can’t be cured.

EFFECTS OF DRUGS

1.      Addiction is defined as the state that leads to the abundant use of a drug in order to get a sense of wellbeing. So repeated use can lead to dependence.

2.      In physical dependency associated with alcoholism, the body needs to work with a level of blood to function normally. When this level drops occurs abstinence syndrome, an organic discomfort.

3.      Psychic dependence is a compulsion to take the drug. Delete this psychological dependence is very difficult and requires some major changes in behavior and a strong will.

Las drogas actuan sobre el sistema nervioso, intensificando o inhibiendo una señal que son los neurotransmisores. Si tenemos dos neuronas ambas se comunican con señales eléctricas. Pero cuando una señal eléctrica llega a la sinapsis se convierte a una señal química (el neurotransmisor: dopamina o droga). Y, la segunda neurona lee la señal química y la transforma en eléctrica y la lleva el cerebro.

Drugs act on the nervous system intensifying or inhibiting a signal, they are neurotransmitters. If both we have two neurons they communicate with electrical signals. But when an electrical signal reaches the synapse is converted to a chemical signal (the neurotransmitter dopamine or a drug). And, the second neuron reads the chemical signal and transforming it into electrical and carries the brain.

''Barranco de La Arena'' camping

  

More or less one month ago, I went to Barraco La Arena camping, and I enjoyed a lot.

The campsite is found in La Guancha, it took us a lot get there, because we live in La Laguna. At 16:00 we arrive and it was really cold.We left our bags and there were a lot of people there so we divided in two rooms (one for the girls, and one for the boys). The teachers were in another room. The campsite had one building with the rooms, one with the kitchen and other one that was the bath.

1. We started the orientation race, that was make around the camping. My partner Andrea and me were the  last ones. When we finished, it had alredy got dark so we return to the camping and we dinner the food that had brought. Later, we went away to sleep.

2. The second day, we woke up and we have breakfast.. Then, we played a game called in spanish ''el escondite'', wile we were waiting a kind of teacher that will explain us some important things about Canarian Pine. I can't remember what  was his name, but I can remember that he was a very young boy. We learned staff like: 

- Pine trees leafs haven't got shapes

- The pines don't have fruits.

- The bark on a pine tree when is young it is smooth and when it gets older, it comes thicker

The best thing of the day was watch this spectacullar view of Teide:

 We also try to see bats in a cave, but they werent there. Other people were proud because the could see them around the camping, but me no.

When return to then camping after a very long excursion, we ate Carbonara Spagettis, made up by Javier.

Later we take the fieldnotebook, and for me it wasn't as bored as I imagine, even it was a good time. 

Then we had a relax evening, and we went sleep.

3.- The third day was the worst for me, because we didn't do something special and it was the day that we had to go to our houses and returns studing day by day. We clean the rooms, we prepare the bags, and we went home. 

NOTE: All days we play a very special game called in spanish ''Los lobos de castro negro''. For my is the best game in the world, and even at night we played. Is a cards game were yo have to find a villain.

ONESTLY THIS ''TRIP'' HAVE BEEN THE BEST THAN I EVER HAD.