Treatment of Schizophrenia and Depression

Prior to beginning work on this discussion, read the required chapters from the text and review the required articles for this week.

Taking on the role of the expert in the treatment of schizophrenia or depression, you will prepare a presentation for a group of physicians who are seeking your opinion on the treatment of patients with these disorders.

For this interactive assignment you will create and upload a 5- to10-slide PowerPoint presentation as well as a five-minute screencast of the presentation to share with your peers.

For this presentation, select either schizophrenia or depression as the basis for your presentation. Begin by creating your PowerPoint presentation. In the presentation, include information which explains the neurotransmitter theory behind the disorder and how the drugs used to treat the disorder affect those neurotransmitter systems.

Evaluate the risk and benefits of treating a patient with the most common type of medication and of not using drugs to treat the patient. In your evaluation, examine issues such as the rate of success with the most common drugs used as well as the incidence of side effects with these same drugs, including mortality associated with drug use. Then consider not using medications to treat the disorder.

Take into account the natural course of the illness, the rate of spontaneous recovery, and the rate of mortality when untreated. You may also incorporate the use of other modes of treatment into your evaluation.

Your PowerPoint must include your presenter notes in the notes field to indicate what you intend to say during the screencast and well-chosen images to enhance the understanding of your audience.

Remember that your screencast will be a maximum of five-minutes, and use your speaker notes to ensure that you will be able to present your materials within this time limit. (You may access Garr Reynolds's Top Ten Slide Tips for additional assistance in creating an effective visual presentation.)

Once you have created your PowerPoint you will create a screencast presentation of up to 5 minutes in length using any screencasting software you choose. (Quick-Start Guides are available for Screencast-O-Matic for your convenience.) Attach your PowerPoint file to your intial post and include the URL for your screencast in the body of the post before submitting it.

Guided Response: Review several of your colleagues' video presentations and respond to at least two of your peers.

You are encouraged to post your required replies earlier in the week to promote more meaningful interactive discourse in this discussion. In your responses to your peers you will take on the role of one of the physicians in the audience. In your responses, consider two of the following aspects from the presentation:

The content of the evaluation: Was it sound, well-reasoned, and based on substantial evidence?

The format of the presentation: Was it easy to understand? Was the sequence of facts well-constructed? Were the visual aids helpful in understanding the meaning of the content?

The video presentation: Was the verbal presentation clear? Was the pacing appropriate for the material(s)? Was the video helpful in understanding the meaning of the content?