Schizophrenia is a chronic mental illness that can cause hallucinations, delusions, and a loss of touch with reality.
While we don’t know exactly what causes schizophrenia, we do understand some of the risk factors, according to Khadijah Watkins, MD, Psychiatrist at Massachusetts General Hospital.
Dr. Watkins is a psychiatrist at Massachusetts General Hospital, where she's the Associate Director of The Clay Center for Young Healthy Minds, and was previously the Associate Training Director of the Child and Adolescent Psychiatry Residency Training Program.
References
Early Psychosis Intervention. (N.D.). Benefits of early intervention.
Khokhar, Jibran Y., et al. (2018). The link between schizophrenia and substance use disorder: a unifying hypothesis. Schizophrenia Research.
National Institute of Mental Health. (2022). Schizophrenia.
Popovic, David, et al. (2019). Childhood trauma in schizophrenia: current findings and research perspectives. Frontiers in Neuroscience.
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