Trial and Follow-up of the Efficacy of Two-stage Integrated Treatment for Chinese Schizophrenia Inpatients

Effects of Integrated Treatment for Chinese Patients With Schizophrenia: 1-year Follow-up

Regular psychosocial intervention combined with antipsychotic drugs, compared with usual medication alone treatments, can reduce psychiatric symptoms and improve quality of life in patients with schizophrenia. However, it's expensive, time-consuming, and sometimes inconvenient for patients and their family members in developing areas where the number of well-trained therapist remains limited in local psychiatric settings. The investigators aimed to establish an efficient model of integrated treatment (IT) for patients with schizophrenia. The procedure contains two stages: a centralized treatment during hospitalization and the following consolidation treatments with long intervals.

Inclusion Criteria:

• Diagnosed with the Structured Clinical Interview for DSM-IV (SCID-DSM-IV) (First et al., 1996), were recruited from inpatient psychiatric ward. Patients with diagnoses of schizoaffective or other psychotic disorders were not included.
• Additional inclusion criteria for participants were aged between 18 and 50 years with education of more than 9 years, and
• PANSS (Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale) total scores of more than 60.

Exclusion Criteria:

• Diagnosed with a serious and unstable medical condition including abuse and/or dependence of alcohol and/or drugs;
• Pregnant or breastfeeding;
• Under a treatment of clozapine with a dose of more than 200 mg/day,
• Had a treatment of the electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) or modified electroconvulsive therapy within 6 months(MECT) within the past six months.