Remission in Patients with First Episode Schizophrenia at Somdet Chaopraya Institute of Psychiatry

ABSTRACT Objective: To study the rate of remission in patients with first episode schizophrenia at Somdet Chaopraya Institute of Psychiatry Method: This was a retrospective descriptive study. Patients who were enrolled in the project for new patients with schizophrenia from January 2006 to December 2008 were the population of this study. The medical records of patients with first episode schizophrenia with 2 years follow-up were studied in this project. According to the Remission in Schizophrenia Working Group (RSWG), the definition of remission criteria in this study was thai had at least 6 months duration, the patients must not be hospitalized and scores of BPRS 7 items (4,7,8,11,12,15,16) and CGI-S must be lower than (mild and mildly ill respectively) in every visit for evaluation. Data were analyzed by descriptive statistics using SPSS version 19. Results: In the study period, there were 494 patients enrolled in the project. Eighty patients met the criteria for first episode schizophrenia with 2 years follow-up. Forty nine cases (61.25%) were male and, 31 cases (38.75%) were female. In 2 years duration, 55 cases (68.75%) were in remission, 8 cases (10%) were not in remission and 17 cases (21.25%) were in remission for some periods of time. For the treatment, 77 cases (96.25%) received conventional antipsychotics and 3 cases (3.75%) received atypical antipsychotics. The most common antipsychotic drugs used was perphenazine (64 cases, 83.12%). The significantly correlated factors were duration of untreated psychosis (DUP) and adherence to medication. Conclusion: Most of the first episode schizophrenia patients with good adherence to medication were in remission. Most patients were treated by conventional antipsychotic drugs.