Introduction: The lifetime prevalence of schizophrenia is approximately 0.7% and incidence rates vary between 7.7 and 43.0 per 100,000; about 75% of people have relapses and continued disability, and one third fail to respond to standard treatment. Positive symptoms include auditory hallucinations, delusions, and thought disorder. Negative symptoms (demotivation, self-neglect, and reduced emotion) have not been consistently improved by any treatment.
Methods and outcomes: We conducted a systematic review and aimed to answer the following clinical questions: What are the effects of drug treatments for positive, negative, or cognitive symptoms of schizophrenia? What are the effects of drug treatments in people with schizophrenia who are resistant to standard antipsychotic drugs? What are the effects of interventions to improve adherence to antipsychotic medication in people with schizophrenia? We searched: Medline, Embase, The Cochrane Library, and other important databases up to May 2010 (Clinical Evidence reviews are updated periodically; please check our website for the most up-to-date version of this review). We included harms alerts from relevant organisations such as the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the UK Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA).
Results: We found 51 systematic reviews, RCTs, or observational studies that met our inclusion criteria. We performed a GRADE evaluation of the quality of evidence for interventions.
Conclusions: In this systematic review, we present information relating to the effectiveness and safety of the following interventions: amisulpride, chlorpromazine, clozapine, depot haloperidol decanoate, haloperidol, olanzapine, pimozide, quetiapine, risperidone, sulpiride, ziprasidone, zotepine, aripiprazole, sertindole, paliperidone, flupentixol, depot flupentixol decanoate, zuclopenthixol, depot zuclopenthixol decanoate, behavioural therapy, clozapine, compliance therapy, first-generation antipsychotic drugs in treatment-resistant people, multiple-session family interventions, psychoeducational interventions, and second-generation antipsychotic drugs in treatment-resistant people.