d in the diagnosis of a person to having the disorder but they are not the final determinate factor. Specialists use the symptoms listed above in there diagnosis but they use them on a laboratory level. Those are one of the two main items used by specialists to determine that a patient has TS or not. The other is based upon the family of the patient. The specialists look at the family past and see if any one else in the person’s family has a form of the disorder. Then they, the specialists, look and see how long ago the family member that had the disorder lived, and how closely the patient and the person in the patient’s family are related (Ward 13). There are no lab tests used in the diagnosis, no blood work, no cat scan, no tests (Ward 13). After being diagnosed with TS a person can undergo some treatment, though limited, to weaken some of the symptoms of the disorder. The treatment that patients undergo is strictly medication. There are six main medicines given to patients. The medications are designed to block dopamine receptors in the basal ganglia (Ward 13). Three of the medications have a multitude of side effects. Those medications are haloperidol, pimozide, and fluphenazine. The side effects created by these medications include things such as tardive dyskinesia, muscle rigidity, weight gain, sedation, impaired academic performance, and social anxiety. The three other medications are risperidome, lanzapine, and thiothixene. Those three medications have very few know side effects (Ward 13).Like most things in life the prognosis for people with the TS disorder has a good side and a not so good side, the bad side. The bad part is that there is no know complete cure for TS. The good side is that a person with Tourette Syndrome ha a life expectancy that is the same as a person without TS. Also the disorder doesn’t impair intelligence and the strength of the tics and vocal outbursts often decrease wit...
