This is a strange disease, but if we analyze it carefully, we all have its shadow more or less, so what kind of disease is it?
Let me first tell the story of an old neighbor of our family.
When I was young, I lived in an old building with many neighbors and a good relationship with the neighbors. Later, due to changes in personnel, everyone gradually moved to live in different places, and gradually I only heard some news.
At that time, there was a neighbor who was also a professor at my father’s university. The family’s surname was L. In my impression, he was a very healthy person who liked sports. I couldn’t imagine that he would suffer from such a disease later.
This is what I heard from my neighbors later. It is said that after he was old, he pressed his stomach once and found some "mass". With some knowledge, he thought it was a tumor, so he started to panic and went to the hospital for investigation, but no tumor was found, so he thought that the hospital's level No, just check everywhere. In the end, he entered such a state that as long as he was at home, he thought he was seriously ill, terminally ill like a tumor, and only in the hospital could he feel at ease. After repeated tossing and tossing like this, in the end, the family had to let him be hospitalized, as if his level was enough, and finally booked a room in the hospital, and stayed in the hospital for a long time for several years, until finally he died in the hospital.
When everyone talked about this process, I thought of this disease in my heart, which is called senile phobia.
So, what kind of disease is this?
This disease is also called senile hypochondriac. Senile hypochondria is a neurotic personality disorder characterized by suspicion of one's own illness.
Hypochondriasis is the abbreviation of hypochondriac neurosis. It is a neurosis characterized by patients who are preoccupied with their own health and worry that certain organs suffer from diseases that they imagine are difficult to cure.
After people get older, due to the degeneration of physiological functions, the body will inevitably experience discomfort in one way or another. This is a normal phenomenon and belongs to the law of nature. However, there are some elderly people who are highly concerned about their own bodies and always experience various "symptoms" of their own bodies. And produce fear, pessimistic negative emotions.
Specifically, such an elderly person has the following characteristics:
1. The patient believes that a certain organ in his body is sick for a long time. What I have seen is basically that he has a serious illness such as cancer. Symptoms, parts, and medical treatment are all introduced one by one. I am afraid that I will miss some information, and I am afraid that the doctor will be negligent.
2. Patients are particularly sensitive and alert to their own changes, even some insignificant small changes, they also seem to pay special attention to, and can "clearly" perceive and pay too much attention to the normal movement of internal organs, such as feeling swelling, beating, and blockage in the body , pulling, twisting, entanglement, flowing, hot air rushing upwards, etc. These self-experienced feelings feel that the body is "out of tune" and are unconsciously exaggerated and misinterpreted as evidence of a serious illness.
3. Patients often feel annoyed, worried or even panic, the severity of which is very inconsistent with the actual situation. Many people have repeated physical examinations and are in good health, but they are still anxious. They are extremely anxious about their own symptoms, and the more others persuade them, the more suspicious they become. Many people ask whether they are really sick from the perspective of Chinese medicine, but Western medicine has not detected it? No, from the point of view of Chinese medicine, there may be a little physical imbalance, but the symptoms are definitely not what they feared, the two are seriously inconsistent, so the heart disease is the main factor.
4. Even if the objective physical examination results confirm that the patient has no lesions, the patient still cannot believe it, or just believes it for a few days, and then continues to doubt it. The doctor's repeated explanations and guarantees cannot dispel doubts, and even patients may think that the doctor has deliberately deceived and concealed behavior.
So, how did this disease come about?
First of all, those old people who are introverted, sensitive, suspicious, stubborn and cautious are prone to hypochondria. Patients often have a strong tendency to narcissism and care too much about their own bodies, but they are not interested in the surrounding things and environment. Scientists even believe that hypochondria is actually another form of narcissism.
My observation is that such people often have no religious beliefs, because religions focus more on benevolence and concern for others. Generally, people under the edification of religion tend to have a wider state of mind, can let go, and are not easy to enter this state.
Secondly, some bad stimuli from the outside world will also aggravate the tendency of hypochondria in the elderly. For example, when hearing or witnessing the illness or death of old friends or colleagues in their social circle, the elderly who are prone to hypochondriacs tend to think of themselves and become worried. In particular, it should be noted that in the process of seeking medical treatment, if the doctor makes a wrong diagnosis or treatment, or the doctor's description of the condition is too serious, it may promote the generation of hypochondria in the elderly.
Of course, this disease cannot be completely regarded as a heart disease. The body also has its basis. For example, I have observed that the disease is more severe in winter and milder in summer. In Chinese medicine, this is related to the imbalance of yin and yang in the patient's body. Insufficient Qi, insufficient righteousness, and stagnant yin and cold, will be more prone to such diseases.
Once this disease occurs, the family is more painful. I have seen a family, the old man suffers from this disease, and always suspects that he has a tumor. Basically, every major hospital has checked it all, and Western medicine can’t help it, because there is no problem in the body, "Healthier than young people", Western medicine finally He said: "What kind of disease do you want to treat? You are not sick. What do you want us to treat for you?" Therefore, every time he was hospitalized, the doctor urged him to leave the hospital, but after two days after returning home, he went home again. I suspected that I had a tumor, so I had to be hospitalized again for examination and treatment.
Such patients are most affected by their family members, because they will repeatedly describe their "disease" to others, and at the same time seek medical treatment continuously, which will put a lot of burden on the family members.
So some family members of the patient reported to me: "He is in good health, better than us young people, but we are going to collapse now."
So, how to treat this disease?
Modern medicine basically believes that this disease is a mental illness and needs a psychiatrist to treat it. However, the effects of psychotherapy I have seen are limited, and I think the help of family members can play a certain role.
Excessive attention to one's own body is a common feature of hypochondria, so family members should first try to help patients divert their attention, so that they can focus on a certain job, or be enthusiastic about a certain hobby, or make more friends. pour out emotions.
Secondly, some psychological experts believe that the root of the disease is the painful experience in the early years, and these early experiences often constitute the root of hypochondriasis. Therefore, family members should help the patient recall more happy past events, reminisce about the happy experience at that time, and imagine a better future Don't let the pain and misfortune of the past hang over and cover you up. Correcting the defects of one's own personality and maintaining an optimistic, cheerful and confident attitude will help the elderly overcome hypochondriacs.
So, how effective is the treatment of this disease?
First of all, Western medicine has a limited role in the treatment of this disease. Some treatments use antidepressant drugs, but the overall evaluation of the efficacy is not high.
The traditional Chinese medicine treatment needs to be analyzed in detail according to the patient's constitution. Generally, when the righteousness is insufficient and the blood is deficient, it will also cause psychological changes. Therefore, if the patient's body can be adjusted to a state of yin and yang balance , it will greatly reduce the discomfort of the patient, which is also very helpful for the recovery of the disease.
Some patients, after a period of continuous recuperation of qi and blood, their physical condition is getting better and better, and they do not pay so much attention to their bodies.
However, I have always felt that for this disease, physical adjustments account for only 20 to 30 percent, while psychological adjustments account for 70 to 80 percent.
Today we just briefly introduce this disease. We will definitely write another article to introduce the Chinese medicine treatment of this disease when we have time in the future. [Young Master Yun: Cough...]
Today I write this article to remind everyone that in fact, many problems of the elderly are difficult to recuperate, because their thinking has already formed a stereotype when they were young and middle-aged. Most of the patients I have seen are If you don't believe it or have no faith, once you encounter problems and have nowhere to release them, your mind will be scattered. If we have a better understanding of this and are vigilant, we can have religious beliefs and learn to cultivate our minds when we are young and middle-aged, and then we will be open-minded when we are old, and such problems will not happen more.
Therefore, this is the final point of my article. This is my heartfelt advice to the patients and their families who have been afflicted by this disease.
