TREATMENT WITH ANTIPSYCHOTICS - THE IMPACT ON THE PATIENT IN THE COMMUNITY

The assessment of new treatment strategies such as the atypical antips ychotic agents goes far beyond the assessment of psychopathology, and includes evaluation of their effects on a variety of needs associated with living in the community. This article provides some empirical dat a for such a multidimensional perspective in analysing drug treatment with conventional antipsychotics. We focus on two groups of schizophre nic patients discharged from a psychiatric hospital, who were followed up for one year. One group was treated with oral and the other with d epot medication. The two groups were assessed on their needs for care, quality of life, and rehospitalisation rates. We found few significan t differences between depot-and orally-medicated patients. However, pa tients treated with depot antipsychotics were receiving higher mean da ily doses. Patients taking oral medication had a lower rate of adverse effects but were more non-compliant, which resulted in a higher rehos pitalisation rate, confirming our assumption that patients take differ ent risk-to-benefit decisions. Orally-medicated patients did not have a better functional status than depot-medicated patients.