The Relationship between Insight and Quality of Life among Schizophrenic Patients

Abstract

Schizophrenia is a chronic mental disorder which involves disturbances of thought, perception, affect, and social behavior. It is ranked among the top ten causes of disability worldwide with mortality rates two times as high as in the general population. Apart from multiple psychopathological symptoms, 56–67% of patients with schizophrenia are characterized by poor illness insight. Poor insight in schizophrenia is associated with lower social functioning, worse general adjustment and noncompliance with antipsychotic treatment. Poor insight in patients with schizophrenia has been linked to more negative attitudes toward medication, longer episodes of antipsychotic non-adherence, more frequent hospitalization, and greater levels of positive and negative symptoms, lower self-esteem as well as worse psychosocial function and quality of life (Misiaka, 2016). Patients with schizophrenia may experience a decrease in functionality, with negative effects on their ability to perform activities of daily living. Moreover, patients with schizophrenia often suffer stigma and discrimination, and show inability to maintain social relationships, as well as impairment of proper social functioning. It difficult for them to self-manage the illness and, consequently, they tend to have a worse level of quality of life (Gomes, 2015).