A SURVEY OF PRESCRIBING PRACTICE OF ANTIPSYCHOTIC MAINTENANCE TREATMENT FOR MANIC-DEPRESSIVE OUTPATIENTS

Survey questionnaires were mailed to public hospital psychiatrists pra ctising in a French region to obtain information on the manic-depressi ve outpatients they personally followed up. Data were collected on 222 manic-depressive outpatients managed by 43 separate psychiatrists. Mo re than two thirds were receiving at least one antipsychotic, and 17% were prescribed a depot-neuroleptic. Predictors of antipsychotic presc ription were a history of psychotic features (OR = 3.4; 95%CI 1.7-6.9) , early age at onset (OR = 2.1; 95%CI 1.0-4.8) and low educational lev el (OR = 3.1; 95%CI 1.5-6.3). Similar predictors were found for depot- neuroleptic prescription. Although these indicate that the prescriptio n of antipsychotic for manic-depressive outpatients is not random, onl y 14% of patients were receiving mood stabilizers only. Owing to the p otential side effects of antipsychotics, the benefit-to-risk ratio of antipsychotic use in the maintenance treatment of manic-depressive pat ients has to be carefully taken into account.