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Abstract The symptoms of what is now called schizophrenia have fascinated physicians and philosophers for thousands cf years. Smarms, in the rd century A.D., described delusions cf grandeur in patients who ”believe themselves to be God” or who ”refuse to urinate for fear of causing a new deluge”. After this early era of detached clinical interest, the schizoprenia was cloaked for well over 1,000 years in the shadows of superstition and religious zeal. Classificatory efforts in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries led to description of symptoms, illness groups, and patterns of recovery. During the nineteenth century, modern psychiatry progressed from observing symptoms to defining specific illness with common manifestations, focussing on related groups of illness and, eventually, studying their underlying somatic and psychological factors. The term schizophrenia is well known but poorly understood. The trouble about the word schizophrenia comes from the fact that psychiatrists disagree about its meaning. Some authors consider it a disease, others a syndrome, others a way of living, others an existence and still others a choice.”). |