Expressed emotion and psychoeducational intervention for relatives of patients with schizophrenia: a randomized controlled study in Japan

The benefit of single-family treatment (SFT) in addition to short education al sessions (SES) consisting of multiple-family treatment was investigated. The study design was a randomized controlled study. Subjects were 30 patie nts suffering from schizophrenia with at least one of their family members showing high expressed emotion (EE) in the Camberwell Family Interview. Aft er the SES, the patients were randomly allocated to two groups: those who r eceived routine individual outpatient treatment and those who received addi tional SFT and routine treatment. The two groups were followed for 9 months after discharge, and the relapse risks were compared. The relapse risk was lower in the SES + SFT group than in the SES group (23.1% vs. 35.3%). Howe ver, the difference was not significant. When high-EE families were classif ied into those with many critical comments (high-CC) or a high score of emo tional overinvolvement (high-EOI), the relapse risk was 0% in the patients living with a high-CC family not only in the SES + SFT group but also in SE S group. In the patients living with a high-EOI family, the relapse risk wa s lower in the SES + SFT group than in the SES group (42.9% vs. 60.0%). The se findings suggest that high-EE families should receive at least SES, and additional SFT should be given to families with specific needs. (C) 2000 El sevier Science Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.