Question:
My brother was diagnosed a few years ago as Paranoid Schizophrenic. Our
only other male cousin has just recently been diagnosed as well. No other
older family members are known to have had this illness. Anyone shed some
light on the genetic side of this illness? Statistically, what are the
chances of my children having this illness?
Answer:
No, if you live a life pattern that is not problematic. If you do not need
help in your thinking, you probably won't hear the voices sometimes
associated with the illness. your child will have a 10% chance of developing schizophrenia according
to what i have read. i have just lurked here because my son is 18 and i
am concerned about his behavior. with an uncle and 2 cousins diagnosed
he has a 3% chance of developing schiz. so i hope you do not mind me
jumping in.
Actualy I rather think that this is a little on the high side. My
understanding is that there is a 10% chance for the children of a
single schizo diagnosed parent. *shrug*
I'd imagine that the chances would decrease signicantly where one is
the child of a sibling of a diagnosed schizo. *shrug*
The info may be wrong but it is what I have been led to believe by my
psych team.
you might try reading the article
http://www.mentalhealth.com/mag1/p5m-sc02.html which puts the risk for
your child at in the order of 2-3%. Given that the average in the
general populace is running at 1% I'd say it's a negligable risk. Hope
this helps some.
My mother has Schizophrenia and I was invited by her Doctor to go an course
for relatives to the ill persons. It was a very good experience and I can
strongly recomand
to learn more about these diseases. I was told that child to one sch.
parent has 14% chance of getting sick and that my daugther runs about 3 %.
As the MadProphet wrote the common people without any known relatives has
a 1 % risk of getting the disease.
I shall also say that my mother has been doin well for the last 5-6 years
due to new medication. Lots of research on this area
My sister, my uncle, and my brother-in-law are all schizophrenic. Now my
husband and I are deciding whether to have children and we're concerned
about whether our children would be very likely to be schizophrenic. Does
anyone know what the chances are, or could you direct me to an article or
book with more information on the heredity issue? In the UK studies have done on immigrant populations which show a high
proportion of schizophrenia compared wiith the indigenous population. The
levels of schizophrenia in their home countries is at normal levels. This
suggest that schizophrenia is more likely to behavioural than inherited.
I would treat the gene for everything fashion with skeptism. From my experience; I agree with you. High levels of stress for an
extended period of time makes "Jack a... uh... something, something,
something." this is very interesting, but what factors would contribute to immigrants
developing schizophrenia at a greater rate than natives? this really doesn't
make sense to me.
i don't really like to subscribe to the idea that there is a gene behind
everything, but at least that makes sense. and it seems like most other
studies prove that some are just genetically predispositioned.
If I remember right, it's actually documented that when people go to
different cultures, they can start having schizophrenic symptoms like
hearing voices, delusions. I think my psychiatrist told me about that,
calling it "cultural psychosis". Mental illness causes behaviours that sometimes affects the quality of
life of the individual affected and others in contact with that
individual. The various forms of schizophrenia is basically common
mental illness like Bi-polar disorder or Compulsive disorder. The only
difference is that God's civilization thru the helpful technologies of
the Celestial Starships interact with these induviduals and assist them
in their thinking. It is not a bad service because God really cares for
individuals who have problems and the celestial beings or angels do
interact with these individuals. The UK do indeed have a Celestial
Starship over their land and it serves the populations there. Sometimes
schizophrenia is best left untreated and sometimes medication is
neccessary because some individuals do not follow helpful suggestions
well. Read the medicine rule in my report. Some mental illness are
hereditary but voices are used if the individual really needs a second
consciouness to assist them. When families pray to God to help their
children and family, God answers their prays. Read: http://cust.iamerica.net/mcab/will.htm
As an ex pat with schizo affective disorder all I can say is that
there are several reasons why it might occur for immigrants more than
natives.
1) Isolation. You are a long way removed from your support group and
attitudes with which you concurr.
2) Poverty. Immigrants tend to have a lower social status than
indigenes. We've had the argument here about genetics leading to lower
social status and schizo disorders but in point of fact I reckon that
the reverse is true.
3) Stress. Living away from ones homeland and facing others prejudices
is _actually_ quite stressful.
Personaly in this I'm with a nature and nurture opinion. I reckon that
genetics could account for a predisposition and that cirumstances
could account for a trigger of that predisposition.
As to what the original poster said I have to concurr having seen some
raw, un-normalised data. In the UK non indigenes suffer a markedly
higher rate of the schizo disorders than indigenes. Even where the
normalised population of country of origin suffer the same nomalised
rate. that is 1%.
Of course it *could* be that those who might later develop the
disorder are more likely to be disatisfied with their lot than the
mass of their countrymen. Who knows? The data is garbage without
serious investigation and noone is likely to make money out of this
data therefore no-one will pay to investigate. Catch 22.
