Is a hypochondriac a character defect or a disorder?

Taking care of your health is inherent in every normal person. However, everyone treats this issue in their own way. One neglects to follow a healthy lifestyle, until the last one will delay a visit to the doctor and will not take a pill for anything, even from a headache. The second, with the slightest indisposition, suspects himself of a terrible illness, begins endless trips to clinics and specialists and is very offended, if to him "do not take seriously." Hypochondriac is just a person who is overly concerned about his state of health.

In relation to one's own state, neither of the extremes can be considered a correct approach. It is impossible to calmly watch and indulge in self-destruction of a person who abuses alcohol and nicotine, devil-may-care for all the recommendations of doctors and relatives. But even if there is a hypochondriac in the family, it becomes a difficult test for relatives. Such a person is constantly worried about the physical condition, he is fickle, he always thinks that he is seriously ill. Doctors, of course, are unable to properly diagnose his "exceptional case."

However, one should not think that everything comes down to Moliere's "Imaginary patient". This comedy character has been continuously concerned with enemas, bloodlettings and compresses. According to modern concepts and the international classification of diseases, hypochondriac is a mental disorder. Similar symptoms are accompanied by other disorders - for example, depression, borderline conditions. The essence of the disorder is that the hypochondriac is a person who is confident in having physical illnesses, whereas the basis of all his ailments is psychosomatic. That is why it is believed that the treatment of drugs to such people is contraindicated. The psychoemotional state of a person in such cases is corrected by self-training, hypnosis, the correct regime of the day, psychotherapy. This disorder is accompanied by increased anxiety, fear, depressed mood. Hypochondriac is a person who is sure that he is seriously ill, so he is inclined to interpret any mild ailments as symptoms of a serious illness. At the same time, he can not understand that his mood and attitudes, in fact, are primary. And only after them appear - as a result of fixing attention on bodily manifestations - various somatic disorders.

Since the disease is associated with increased anxiety and depressiveness, a general psychological and psychiatric characteristic of a person's condition will be a necessary cure condition. Various test methods help to detect and confirm the presence of personality deviations. Since the hypochondriac is a person who ignores the "simple" explanations of his unpleasant sensations (pierced in the chest - hence, a heart attack, a headache - certainly a tumor, and not just fatigue or a change of weather), he needs the help of a doctor-psychotherapist. It should also be noted that the development and spread of the disorder is facilitated by all sorts of "science-like" and pseudo-professional articles in newspapers and the Internet on health. Journalists just love to make a huge elephant out of a tiny fly, and the pharmaceutical concerns that are interested in selling their products come to their aid. That's why the philistine, who lacks knowledge in medicine and the achievements of science, so easily finds himself on a newspaper pole. And there are just what terrible diseases are not described ... Take care of your health, but with the mind.