Schizophrenia
Clinical implications - Schizophrenia and Gender
Assessment
Textbook descriptions of schizophrenia are of male-type schizophrenia. When assessing women, clinicians may miss a…
Brain Abnormalities - Schizophrenia and Gender
On magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans, reduced cortical brain areas, small left hippocampal formations, and enlarged lateral ventricles…
Childhood development - Schizophrenia and Gender
Adult-onset schizophrenia is preceded in childhood by mild neuromotor, cognitive, and behavioral anomalies that occur with the same…
Social Role Effectiveness - Schizophrenia and Gender
Female patients with schizophrenia, more often than men, are able to enter into and maintain social roles. For…
Schizophrenia and Gender
Gender effects are important to schizophrenia. Why is that so? First, they are important because of the many…
Training the trainers
One of the great therapeutic accomplishments of the second half of the 20th century was the establishment of…
Clinical Experience with the Friendship and Intimacy Module
The module has been in active use for the past 2 years at the Hollywood Mental Health Center’s…
Sexual dysfunction affecting persons with schizophrenia
Despite a healthy interest in sex, many people with schizophrenia report a progressive deterioration of their sexual and…
Psychoeducational programs for teaching safe sex
During the past two decades, a relatively small number of sexual education programs designed for mentally disabled persons…
Friendship and intimacy module
Although few psychiatric rehabilitation programs have comprehensively addressed the friendship and intimacy needs of seriously mentally ill persons,…
Schizophrenia and Sexuality
Sexual functioning and its consequences should be a clinically important concern for practitioners and programs serving the needs…
Pharmacotherapy - Schizophrenia in African Americans
Although psychosocial support is important in managing schizophrenia, pharmacotherapy remains essential for maintenance and recovery. Unfortunately, the treatment…
Sociocultural Factors - Schizophrenia in African Americans
African American families face the challenge of having limited resources. The direct costs of schizophrenia often exceed the…
Schizophrenia in African Americans
Schizophrenia is considered the most severe psychiatric disorder. It has a poor prognosis, an unknown etiology, and an…
Depression and schizophrenia ‘should be treated with therapy’
Psychological therapy should be offered to every person in the country with depression, anxiety or schizophrenia, says a…
Depression in the Course of Schizophrenia
It is generally accepted that the first building block of modern psychiatric nosology was Kraepelin’s distinction between those…
Vulnerability, Stress, and Psychiatric Diatheses: A Hypothetical Model
Figure 21 depicts an integrative schema that conceptualizes the interplay of extrinsic and intrinsic factors with the schizophrenia…
Treatment Strategies
An appropriate treatment approach to depression begins with a consideration of the differential diagnostic possibilities outlined earlier in…
Incidence and Prevalence of Depression in Patients With Schizophrenia
More than two dozen studies have been published examining the rates of occurrence of depression in the course…
Differential Diagnosis of Depression in the Course of Schizophrenia
Medical/Organic Factors
A large number of medical/organic factors are possible as causes of depression in…
HIV and Hepatitis C in Patients With Schizophrenia
Introduction
Among the chronic health conditions experienced by people with schizophrenia, infection with human immunodeficiency virus…
Rational Psychopharmacology for People With HIV/ HCV and Schizophrenia
HIV-related psychopharmacological interventions for people with preexisting schizophrenia follow similar guidelines for patients with new-onset psychosis associated with…
Clinical Considerations
Risk Reduction Interventions and Strategies for HIV/HCV
HIV prevention programs that primarily dispense AIDS information have…
Accessing the Range of HIV/HCV-Related Services That Psychiatric Patients Need
Mental health service settings vary in their ability to offer HIV-related interventions, and the range of services available…
HCV Treatment
Diagnostic testing to determine the presence of HCV viremia and the extent of liver pathology should be completed…
HIV/AIDS Treatment
Clinical management is intended to decrease viral load, increase CD4 cell count, provide prophylaxis against OIs as appropriate,…
HCV Transmission and Testing
Given preliminary estimates that one in five patients with severe mental illness is infected with HCV, a strong…
HIV Transmissibility
Although HIV has been isolated from a variety of body fluids, including blood, semen, vaginal secretions, breast milk,…
Natural History of HIV Disease
HIV targets host CD4 T lymphocytes by identifying certain surface molecules and attaching to and entering the cells…
HIV/HCV Knowledge Among People With Severe Mental Illness and Their Providers
AIDS is the ultimate result of HIV infection, and knowledge about AIDSrelated issues among United States and Canadian…
Basic Overview of Course of Illness and Treatment of HIV/AIDS
Approximately 940,000 persons in North America and about 40 million persons worldwide are infected with HIV. Infection with…
Substance Use Risk Behaviors Among People With Schizophrenia
Substance Use Risk Behaviors Among People With Schizophrenia and Their Association With Psychiatric and Situational Factors
Sexual Risk Behaviors Among People With Schizophrenia
Sexual Risk Behaviors Among People With Schizophrenia and Their Association With Psychiatric and Situational Factors
Obesity and Mental Illness
Obesity is a complex multifactorial chronic disease that develops from the interaction between genotype and the environment. Obesity…
Obesity in Schizophrenia
In the pre-antipsychotic era, Kraepelin noted that some patients with schizophrenia exhibited bizarre eating habits, and not uncommonly…
Behavioral Treatment
Behavioral interventions such as calorie restriction, exercise, and behavioral modification are key elements to successful, sustained weight loss…
Pharmacological Treatment of Obesity in Schizophrenia
The literature thus far suggests that some of the novel antipsychotic medications cause less weight gain than others;…
Weight Monitoring for Schizophrenia
The effects of antipsychotic-related weight gain have both medical and psychiatric components. In particular, medication compliance is adversely…
Psychopharmacology of Weight Gain
Novel antipsychotic medications and conventional antipsychotic medications affect a number of central neurotransmitter systems that may have an…
The Epidemic of Obesity
Obesity and its related sequelae represent a growing epidemic in the United States. Overweight is defined by the…
Schizophrenia Complications
The major complications are to quality of life:
- An acute psychotic illness…
Drug abuse underlies schizophrenia tie to violence
People with schizophrenia may have a reputation for being involved in violent crime, but that seems to be…
Schizophrenia does not increase risk of violent crime
A new study from the Swedish medical university Karolinska Institutet and the University of Oxford finds that the…
Schizophrenia-type illness linked to heart risk
The high rate of heart disease seen in people with “schizophrenia spectrum disorders” is not totally explained by…
Substance abuse factor in higher risk of violent crime by persons with schizophrenia
The increased risk of persons with schizophrenia committing violent crime may be largely mediated by co-existing substance abuse…
International Study of Schizophrenia
Further development of this finding has been taken on by the WHO International Study of Schizophrenia (ISoS). This…
Caribbean studies - Schizophrenia
The remaining incidence studies were conducted in Caribbean countries not plainly representative of developing countries. The level of…
Schizophrenia Course and outcome
Scattered early reports that complete remission of schizophrenia was common in developing countries, in spite of the unavailability…
The Ten Country Study - Schizophrenia
The IPSS was followed by another study coordinated by the WHO, the Ten Country Study described above (Sartorius…
Geographical variation in incidence, course and outcome of schizophrenia
Geographical variation in incidence, course and outcome of schizophrenia: a comparison of developing and developed countries
Future directions: what type of research do we need?
There is an urgent need for strategic research designed to generate and rigorously test candidate nongenetic, risk-modifying factors…
Developmental risk factors: from infancy to onset
The Copenhagen High Risk Cohort (Schulsinger et al., 1987) reported that high-risk individuals (offspring of mothers with schizophrenia)…
Possible preventive strategies in schizophrenia
Selective prevention
While this section will focus on the universal prevention of schizophrenia, it is…
Schizophrenia risk factors and causes
In order to develop a framework for primary prevention, it is important to understand terminology surrounding risk factors…
Prevention of schizophrenia
Introduction
In arguing for increased research funding, attention is often drawn to the finding that schizophrenia…
Cognition Already Seriously Impaired in First Episode of Schizophrenia
Significant and widespread cognitive problems appear to exist in schizophrenia in its earliest phase, making it very hard…
Ethics of clinical research in schizophrenia
Research ethics is concerned with the moral principles and rules that govern the conduct of scientific study involving…
Ethics of client-centered care in schizophrenia
Client-centered care, also termed patient-centered care and person-centered care, is now considered a mainstay of acceptable health care,…
Ethics
Health problems and health care frequently raise ethical issues of various types. The discipline that addresses such ethical…
The Neurodevelopmental model of Schizophrenia
The neurodevelopmental model of schizophrenia provides a framework for understanding how OCs interact with the developing brain to…
What types of OCs are associated with Schizophrenia?
OCs have been linked to the etiology of schizophrenia since the 1960s when Lane and Albee (1966) first…
How do OCs operate within the etiology of Schizophrenia?
An array of models has been proposed to explain how OCs contribute to the causes of schizophrenia. We…
Envoronmental Pre- and Perinatal Influences in Etiology
A few specific pregnancy and perinatal factors were associated with the subsequent development of psychotic disorder, particularly schizophrenia,…
Schizophrenia - Diagnostic Interviewing
Schizophrenia, which is considered the most severe psychiatric disorder, is characterized by many impairments, such as psychosis and…
Schizophrenia - Interviewing strategies
The current most widely accepted approach for diagnostic interviewing in psychiatric assessment is the use of structured interviews.…
Schizophrenia - Interviewing Guidelines
Psychiatric diagnosis involves use of generic clinical assessment skills, such as combining open-ended and close-ended questions, as well…
How do we determine if a treatment is working?
Measuring treatment quality is important if treatment professionals wish to improve it. If you don’t know if something…
Top ten myths about schizophrenia
Unfortunately, many people know very little about schizophrenia and other forms of mental illness. Society has several misconceptions…
How can you help?
By reading this section and educating yourself about schizophrenia, you have taken the first step to help eliminate…
Outlook for the Future
Three months after his hospitalization, Kevin returned home to live with his parents. It has been a difficult…
Family Environment - schizophrenia
Although early schizophrenia researchers such as Bleuler and Kraepelin insisted that schizophrenia is, at its core, a disease…
Schizophrenia and Neurotransmitters
When scientists study how the brains of people with mental illness are different, they are commonly interested in…
Brain Differences in schizophrenia
In the past, researchers could only examine the brain after a patient died. Now, there is technology that…
Schizophrenia causes - Prenatal Environment
When we think of a child’s “environment,” we tend to think of their family and friends. In fact,…
Adoption Studies
Why are some twin pairs concordant for schizophrenia whereas others are not? There must be factors other than…
Risk factors for schizophrenia
Why do some people develop schizophrenia rather than others? Risk factors are the characteristics that may make a…
Schizophrenia causes
The causes of schizophrenia are not known. However, an interplay of genetic, biological, environmental, and psychological factors are…
Lactation and antipsychotic medication
A drug that is safe for use during pregnancy may not be safe for the nursing infant. Exposure…
Pregnancy and prescribing antipsychotics
Guidelines for prescribing antipsychotics during pregnancy and lactation include the following:
Antipsychotic treatment response and serum levels in men and women
Genetics, age, height, weight, lean-fat ratio, diet, exercise, concurrent disease, smoking and alcohol, and the administration of concomitant…
Schizophrenia in women and men
The diagnosis of schizophrenia is usually made between ages 15 and 25. During those 10 years, schizophrenia is…
Obstetric complications in women with schizophrenia
It is not known whether schizophrenic women have increased incidence of complications during pregnancy and delivery. Data from…
Schizophrenia - Prevention & Curing Protocol
This Schizophrenia Prevention and/or Curing Protocol is for people who are ready to take the full responsibility…
The prevention of schizophrenia
Preventive strategies can be divided into universal, selective and indicated prevention and early intervention. Universal interventions are directed…
Preventing Schizophrenia
Research conducted in the past decade indicates that schizophrenia is due to a genetic predisposition and environmental stressors…
Abnormal fetal growth and development
Low birth weight has been associated with schizophrenia throughout each era of investigation, but this association is not…
Why Is It So Difficult to Study Obstetric Complications and Schizophrenia?
Statistical Power
The effect sizes for the relationship between obstetric risk factors and later schizophrenia are…
Obstetric Complications and Schizophrenia: Historical and Meta-Analytic Review
The much-investigated association between obstetric complications and schizophrenia has provided crucial support for developmental and nongenetic etiological models…
Preventing Schizophrenia
We wear seat belts when we drive in a car, so that we are protected if we get…
Dual-Diagnosis patients: Schizophrenia and Substance abuse
Patients with schizophrenia who abuse drugs or alcohol are called dual-diagnosis patients. A dual-diagnosis patient has two diagnoses;…
Stress on Families - schizophrenia
Long before schizophrenia is diagnosed, relatives of someone with the disorder may begin to feel stressed. Prodromal, or…
Homelessness - schizophrenia
Unfortunately, some of the most severely ill schizophrenia patients leave a safe place like a hospital or private…
Violence and trouble with the Law
People who exhibit unpredictable behavior can be frightening.
Suicide and schizophrenia
On average, about one out of 10 schizophrenic patients commits suicide. The high risk of suicide in schizophrenia…
Impact on Families and Society
Kevin has been in the hospital for six weeks and has improved significantly. The voices are not bothering…
Schizophrenia Treatment and Outcome
Dr. Talbot is fairly certain that Kevin meets the diagnostic criteria for schizophrenia. His hallucinations and delusions are…
Schizophrenia Psychological Treatments
Many patients must try a variety of medications before finding one that controls their symptoms. This can be…
Schizophrenia Typical & Atypical Antipsychotic Medication
Typical Antipsychotic Medication
The first medications designed to treat schizophrenia are now called typical antipsychotic medications,…
Schizophrenia Social Skills Training
Patients with schizophrenia often have very poor interpersonal skills. Making appropriate eye contact, controlling the volume of their…
Schizophrenia Family Therapy
Dealing with a family member with a serious mental illness can be difficult. In order to make the…


