Q. My psychiatrist has recently prescribed Olanzapine for me. He said it was to help me sleep, and to help with PTSD. But when I looked up the med here on the Internet, it appears that the only way it is used is strictly for schizophrenia. What do you think? Have you ever heard of it being used for anything but schiz? Does this mean he believes I may be schizophrenic?
A. This is such an excellent and important question.
I need to ask you a question: do you use your car to drive to the doctor or to the grocery store? The obvious answer is “both.”
Just like your care, many medications have multiple uses. A good example is aspirin. It’s from a plant – deer and other animals will lick the willow bark to stop pain. Aspirin’s main use was for pain. We now know it works for fever, arthritis, and preventing diseases like heart attacks, strokes, and cancer.
I don’t know all your diagnoses, but your physician likely feels some of your most troublesome symptoms are psychotic. Psychosis simply means misinterpretation of reality. In the PTSD (post traumatic stress disorder) it’s a defense your body uses to protect you from your trauma.
Much of what Freud believed is no longer accepted. One that is clearly true: it’s the defenses we employ, not the actual trauma, that causes most of the damage. When the brain perceives that psychosis is a necessary defense life becomes very, very difficult. Antipsychotic medications are very helpful in this regard.
Olanzapine is an extremely effective medication to stop many psychotic symptoms. It is used for many causes of psychosis including schizophrenia. There is no link between PTSD and schizophrenia.