Self-medicating is never the answer for treating schizophrenia

There is a growing trend amongst those in the mental health community to push aside proven, albeit slightly unpredictable prescription medications and instead look to illicit drugs for relief from conditions such as schizophrenia. The aim is to wrestle back control from a pharmaceutical industry that rakes in billions of dollars per year while attempting to live a more “natural” lifestyle. However, even the use of marijuana to treat mental health disorders is highly controversial. Things can get truly out of control when people look to shady drug dealers to bring them relief. Here are just a few reasons why you are safer in the hands of Pfizer.

Issues with purity

Probably the biggest issue with street drugs is purity. Even if you are able to somewhat accurately judge how particular substances affect you and your schizophrenia, there is no way to reproduce that affect accurately over and over again with a street drug that varies in potency with every dose. Even within the same batch you could have completely different reactions due to the unscientific way street drugs are made. Some illicit drug users are careful to use the same dealer and feel like once they build a relationship, they’ll get the same stuff every time, but the utter and complete lack of quality control makes that impossible. There is a reason why major pharmaceutical companies spend millions of dollars ensuring that pill 1 is exactly the same as pill 1000 and so on.

Problems with dosing

Since there are such obvious issues with illicit drug purity, it would stand to reason that dosing would also be impossible. It is ironic in a way since the main reason why so many people forsake prescription drugs is because they don’t want to take the time to adjust their dosage over a period of months to find their ideal levels. With illicit drugs, that ideal level can never, ever be found. The expensive machinery used by major pharmaceutical companies to ensure dosing levels are the same in every pill costs millions of dollars. It is safe to say that the guy on the corner hasn’t made that kind of investment yet.

Unknown reactions

As if matters weren’t complicated enough, drug dealers often use outside ingredients in their drugs to stretch batches and increase profit. In some cases, the ingredients they turn to are completely harmless, such as baking soda or powdered sugar. In other cases, harsh chemicals can be used that cause fatal reactions if taken in large quantities. In the case of some drugs, a less expensive drug will be used. Regardless of which category your next batch falls into, you can be sure that your body won’t react the same way twice, and when you are treating a delicate condition like schizophrenia, that kind of unpredictability is unacceptable.

Med conflicts

Often times, a sufferer of schizophrenia will be stable on certain meds but will then have a new med prescribed and that delicate balance will be so badly disrupted that the patient will either go cold turkey or decide to drop the problem med while continuing to take the others and seek an illicit drug to fill in the gap. This is a bad choice for several reasons. Your pharmacist has an extensive database on file that automatically warms him or her that a drug conflict is present. There is no way to predict how your body will react to prescription meds and illicit drugs at the same time, and it is better for everyone involved if you never find out.

Solving the problem

As painful a process as it can be, you are better off taking the prescription meds your doctor prescribes and deliberately working through your dosing issues until an ideal balance can be found. It can take months but dabbling in illicit drugs in an attempt to treat schizophrenia is never a good idea.

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