First Episode Psychosis - Anti-Psychotic Drugs

[Barquentine]

My mother-in-law think she can hear her neighbours talking about her through the walls of her terraced house. She is staying with us to get away from them, but they have now moved in to the elderly man's house next door to us. Psychiatrist has been to see her and prescribed mild anti-psychotic drug - very low dose. Since starting them two weeks ago she seems to me to have got worse. Has anyone else noticed this - right at the beginning of a person's brain errors - once they start medication? The idea occurred to me last night that the pharmaceutical companies have a vested interest in selling their product. Psychiatrists will not know (I would not expect them to) the precise mechanisms of how any partic. drug works (that is for the experts developing the drugs). Could it be the case that doctors (i.e. psychiatrists et al.)are incentivised to prescribe, that the drugs actually have the opposite effect to what is expected (although precisely the effect the parm-co intends) in order to induce larger doses and prolonged use - with a view to ever increasing profit? I can see quite clearly this sounds like a paranoid conspiracy theory - but now armed with hundreds of news stories of people assuming things were being done properly and regulators regulating - with catastrophic consequences when these lazy, blinkered, let's-look-the-other-way assumptions proved to be empty - could it really be possible this anti-psychotic M-i-L is taking is causing the worsening symptoms I seem to be seeing?

[wolf63]

Or it could be that you are being paranoid.

Seriously - there are many different antipsychotics so if you feel that this one isn't working another may. See her doctor.

[MrsCheese]

A healthy patient is a lost sale

[Barquentine]

I think Wolf63 is out to get me! MrsCheese is more on my wavelength.
I know it sounds completely crazy (which is ironic given the subject) - to doubt the entire infrastructure of a successful medical endeavour - the development of drugs that cure or mitigate - but I think with politicians like we have - I reckon if the Queen told me my date of birth I would want to check my birth certificate, just in case she lied to me! Only science and medicine (doctors and surgeons) still have my respect. Every other human endeavour has been revealed as fake, mediocre, under-achieving - no progress in how politics is done over the last seven decades (OMG - have I really lived in 7 decades - I feel so old!). Science in general and medicine in particular have made ineffable advances - but the sludge of pond-scum politicians and their paid lackey sidekicks - the judiciary and news media need a thorough cleansing. So, yeah, actually my loony mad conspiracy theory that mother-in-law's drugs are doing the exact opposite of what they are supposed to is almost certainly bang-on. Now - just need to persuade my wife to get her mum to stop taking them for a week to see if that helps. Except, my wife thinks I'm a nutter! I wonder why...!!

[Boto]

'my wife thinks I'm a nutter' she's not the only one! Sorry, but you do sound paranoid.

[TheChair]

So your MIL moved to get away from her neighbours, and they immediately moved to be next door? No wonder she's paranoid!

[Bazile]

//She is staying with us to get away from them, but they have now moved in to the elderly man's house next door to us.//

Your MIL has left her house and moved in with you.?

Her neighbours have then left their house and moved next door to you ?

[Bazile]

lol - I didn't see TheChair response before I posted

[Spicerack]

You don't have to be paranoid to distrust 'big pharma'. They have a terrible record for putting profits before patients.

[Cloverjo]

Sending a psychiatrist to see her and giving anti-psychotic seems quite a sledgehammer approach.

It could be something as simple as a urinary tract infection. That can make older people go a bit unhinged. She should see her GP about possible antibiotics.

[roopower]

This may sound stupid but has your minl been checked over by a doctor, particularly for a urine infection? My husbands sister went through similar problems with her minl, hearing voices, seeing things etc. They thought she was going mad but it turned out she had a severe water infection which took some time to clear but she is absolutely fine now.

[Spicerack]

Ah, I thought Barquentine's MIL was imagining her old neighbours had moved next door. Maybe not.

[Gizmonster]

Is there any reason why she can't move back into her own home to escape the neighbours? If they move back next door to her again ...... then I think, even you should be paranoid .....

[bednobs]

i read it as part of the problem is the MIL only THINKS they have moved in next door (they havent actually moved in0
If she's getting worse rather than improving you need to contact the gp (or the prescriber, if you have the means to do that)
In answer to your original OP, No, i do not think pharmaceutical companies do that. Doctors nd pharmacists DO know the mechanism by which various drugs work, and drugs have to have extensive trials before they are allowed to be prescribed. Docotrs will also work off experience, and this doctor will have prescribed this drug thousands of times before and it will have worked; sometimes it will not have worked. However, the psychiatrist is not a mind reader and will not know it hasn't worked in your MIL's case.
In any case imo 2 weeks isnt really a long enough trial (unless her symptoms have worsened dramatically, or she's developed new symptoms related to the drugs)

[Spicerack]

//However, the psychiatrist is not a mind reader//

Well.....

[bednobs]

lol in the sense that they won't know the problems the MIL is experiencing unless someone actually tells them

[bednobs]

perhaps i should have said "not psychic"

[Barquentine]

No, The Chair and Bazile, they haven't moved next door - she thinks they have because she can hear them talking! I suggested she move back to her house since their landlord whom she trusts told her himself they have gone. Her logic/reasoning abilities are still working. But when I confront her with inconsistencies in what, I am sure, seems very real to her, she goes quiet and won't answer. There is a gap between her logic and the scenario her brain is creating, but she does not seem able to reject the latter. I may be making things worse by highlighting how unlikely it is her former neighbours would ave moved as soon as she did -so now she thinks they are part of the mafia and they are waiting for her in a black Mercedes parked outside and there are other waiting in her road - i.e. her brain as extended the imaginary story to deal with the gaps I highlighted. Bednobs answer is most helpful. We will continue and maybe they will work - and I will stop trying to rationalise things with her since that might make things worse. U.T.I was ruled out with blood test at start. I also think her Eustachean tube, tympanum and nasopharyngeal fluid with pressure problems in inner ear might be making physical noises in her head - which her brain is constructing into speech. She has runny nose, ears feel blocked and acid reflux - all caused by n/ph fluid leaking down eustachean tube into nose/throat. I keep suggesting she see an otologist - but her GP is woeful and my wife and MiL are not pursuing this 'diagnosis' - actually a complete guess based on a YouTube video. Can anyone either support my ear-problem idea or dismiss it please?