Schizophrenia and alcoholism are often diagnosed together, possibly because the overt symptoms of the former expose the damage done by the latter. However, this situation can be problematic because of the nature of the two conditions as well as their interactions. Levinthal (2014) claims that organic brain damage, such as that caused by chronic alcohol abuse, can be challenging to distinguish from the genuine mental condition. As such, medical practitioners struggle to prescribe treatments that are appropriate to the patient’s situation. A mistake that results from such a problem can complicate the patient’s treatment.
While alcoholism can make schizophrenia cases more challenging to address, the opposite is also true. Gold, Lydiard, and Carman (2018) claim that patients with mental conditions can respond poorly to treatment approaches such as Alcoholics Anonymous. As their responses to these methods are unpredictable, initial exposure should occur while they are undergoing treatment in a hospital. It can help medical workers understand the patient’s responses and choose a treatment strategy that will address both conditions best. As a part of this tendency, they also have to understand the interactions of alcoholism with specific medicines.
Alcohol can interact with various medications in negative ways, generating adverse side effects and other complications. According to Gold, Lydiard, and Carman (2018), schizophrenic patients who keep consuming alcohol tend to develop chronic psychosis and stop responding to neuroleptic medication. These drugs constitute a large portion of the overall medicines used in the treatment of the illness. As such, while they do not put themselves into danger directly, many treatments will be ineffective. Hospitalization is often recommended to avoid these issues and monitor patients with both conditions in controlled conditions.
References
Gold, M. S., Lydiard, R. B., & Carman, J. S. (eds.). (2018). Advances in psychopharmacology: Improving treatment response. Boca Raton, FL: CRC Press.
Levinthal, C. F. (2014). Drugs, behavior and modern society (8th ed.). London, United Kingdom: Pearson Education.