Two-year follow-up of cognitive-behavioral therapy and supportive counseling in the treatment of persistent symptoms in chronic schizophrenia

The article reports the 2-year follow-up of patients suffering persistent s ymptoms of schizophrenia who entered a single blind randomized controlled t rial. Patients were randomly allocated to cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT ) plus routine care (RC), supportive counseling (SC) plus RC, or RC alone. Treatment took place over 3 months, and follow-up was made 12 and 24 months after treatment finished. Sixty-one patients were available to the 2-year follow-up and assessed for positive and negative symptoms and clinical impr ovement; all of the 87 patients who entered the trial were assessed for rel apse over the follow-up period. On all measures, patients who received RC a lone did significantly worse at 2 years. There were no significant differen ces at 2 years between the CBT and SC groups.