mental illness

illness /ill·ness/ (il´nes) disease.

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emotional illness  a colloquialism for mental disorder, but not usually including mental retardation or mental disorders with a specific, known, organic etiology.

mental illness  see under disorder.

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mental illness

n.

Any of various psychiatric conditions, usually characterized by impairment of an individual's normal cognitive, emotional, or behavioral functioning, and caused by physiological or psychosocial factors. Also called mental disease, mental disorder.

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mental illness.

See mental disorder.

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mental illness

Mental disorder, see there

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Patient discussion about mental illness.

Q. Everyone on my mother's side has mental illness and addictions. How do you convince someone they need help? It seems to be an inherited bi-polar disorder. An uncle shot his wife. A brother shot his wife and killed himself. My son has been diagnosed as bi-polar. How do I convince or get help for other family members who are in denial?

A. Hi Debra - thank you so much for sharing your story with us. We have a great bipolar community at www.imedix.com/bipolar. you can speak with our amazing bipolar community leader JennJ. Please feel free to ask questions and find more health information here. we have videos, articles and tons of bipolars that can help you and share their experiences. Let me know if there's anything I can help you with as I'm the iMedix community manager.

Q. Whats schizoaffective disease its a mental disease

A. Schizoaffective disorder is a mental illness that shares the psychotic symptoms of schizophrenia and the mood disturbances of depression or bipolar disorder. The term schizoaffective disorder was first used in the 1930s to describe patients with acute psychotic symptoms such as hallucinations and delusions along with disturbed mood. These patients tended to function well before becoming psychotic; their psychotic symptoms lasted relatively briefly; and they tended to do well afterward. For the full article:
http://www.healthatoz.com/healthatoz/Atoz/common/standard/transform.jsp?requestURI=/healthatoz/Atoz/ency/schizoaffective_disorder.jsp

Hope this helps.

Q. How do you know the difference if the child has ADHD or have other mental disorders? The child has been of ADHD medication for four years give or take a few months. The problems are getting gradually worse. She has no patience with anything, can’t sit still. She is ten years old but she acts like she is 6.

A. Sometimes, seasonal allergies can intensify behavior. I have a child with adhd who changes dramatically around fall and spring and it takes a couple of months for her to return to a lower level of adhd-ness. I recently took her to an allergist and found out she's allergic to weeds (fall) and a number of trees (spring).