Brief Psychotic DisorderThough often misunderstood by family and friends, brief psychotic disorder is a serious illness that can occur without warning. In order to better identify a brief psychotic episode, it is important to understand what the disorder is, its symptoms, and how it is diagnosed and treated.
Brief psychotic disorder is a period of psychosis that lasts anywhere from one day to one month. Essentially, it is a brief break from reality. One distinction between this disorder versus other psychotic disorders is that the person suffering from the brief psychotic episode eventually returns to a baseline, or "normal," level of functioning. After returning to the baseline level of functioning, most people recover. More rarely, some people will have recurring episodes. This disorder is not common in the United States, but does occur more frequently in women than in men. It typically occurs in early adulthood (between twenty and thirty years old) in both men and women.
The psychosis generally occurs without forewarning, though is more likely to occur in people with a pre-existing condition, such as a personality disorder. However, severe stress factors, such as the death of a loved one, severe illness, employment or financial problems, family conflicts, or accidents, can lead to brief reactive psychosis. This means the psychotic episode is in reaction to some traumatic event. It can also occur approximately four weeks postpartum as brief reactive psychosis.
As mentioned, the symptoms of this psychotic disorder will come on without forewarning. The common symptoms include hallucinations, delusions, disorganized speech, disorganized behavior, and sometimes, catatonic behavior. While these are the most common symptoms, they are certainly not the only symptoms that may manifest in brief psychotic disorder. Other symptoms that are often associated with this psychotic disorder are rapid mood changes, disorientation, homicidal or suicidal thoughts or behaviors, and impaired attention. People may also exhibit emotional volatility, screaming or muteness, loss of memory for recent events, and outlandish dress or behavior. Brief psychotic disorder does not apply if the symptoms can be explained by schizophrenia, a mood disorder with psychotic features, schizoaffective disorder, and is not caused by a substance such as drug abuse or medication.
If the symptoms of brief psychosis disorder are present, a complete medical history and examination will be given, which rules out possible physical causes for the symptoms. If no physical cause for the symptoms is found, the person will be given a mental evaluation by a mental health professional. The evaluation will determine whether the person is experiencing a brief psychotic episode, or whether the symptoms can be attributed to another mental or emotional cause, such as a mood disorder.
The most common treatment for brief psychotic disorder is psychotherapy. Since most people recover after the initial psychotic episode, medication is not needed. Instead, psychotherapy is the most effective treatment. The psychotherapy can be either group therapy or individual therapy, depending on that person's needs and experiences. Depending on the severity of the symptoms of this psychotic disorder, someone who experiences it may need to be hospitalized for a brief time in order to prevent harm to him or herself, or to someone else.
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