When there is an excess of Dopamine in the brain it leads to confusion of the messages thereby causing various mental ailments. Antipsychotic drugs help to block the reuptake of Dopamine from the cells as a consequence of which Dopamine is decreased in the cells. This as a result decreases the symptoms in the patient.
There are two major types of antipsychotic medications namely the typical antipsychotic medications and the atypical antipsychotic drugs. Though both of them work equally to reduce and control the symptoms that a patient exhibits when he is suffering from any of the mental diseases mentioned above, the new antipsychotic medications or the atypical antipsychotic drugs are considered better because they are said to have lesser side effects than the first set of medications. Of course they are not completely without side effects, but they are far less. Two of the main side effects of the newer antipsychotic medications are weight gain and metabolic syndrome. These drugs are also referred to as the second generation antipsychotic medications and are more expensive that the typical antipsychotic drugs.
When a person is suffering from mental disorders, doctors usually prescribe one of the medications from the new antipsychotic medications list that can help in alleviating the symptoms, though they will not help in curing the disease altogether. Some of the drugs that belong to the new antipsychotic medications list are Zyprexa, Prolixin, Abilify, Clozaril, Geodon, Haldol, Risperdal, Seroquel, Thorazine, Trilafon to mention a few.