Long-acting oral vs injectable antipsychotic drugs in schizophrenics: a one-year double-blind comparison in multiple episode schizophrenics. Penfluridol: a long acting oral antipsychotic drug. Penfluridol maintenance therapy in schizophrenia: a controlled study. Study of penfluridol and chlorpromazine in the treatment of chronic schizophrenia. Peroral and parenteral administration of long-acting neuroleptics: a double-blind study of penfluridol compared to flupenthixol decanoate in the treatment of schizophrenia. Controlled trial of penfluridol and thiothixene in the maintenance treatment of chronic schizophrenic syndromes. A controlled study of penfluridol in the treatment of chronic schizophrenia. Penfluridol: a long-acting oral neuroleptic. A controlled study. Comparative short-term evaluation of penfluridol and trifluoperazine in chronic schizophrenia. A double-blind clinical evaluation of penfluridol (R 16 341) as a maintenance therapy in schizophrenia. Controlled trial of penfluridol in acute psychosis. A twelve month comparison of penfluridol and trifluoperazine in chronic schizophrenic outpatients. Efficacy and safety of donepezil in patients with schizophrenia or schizoaffective disorder: significant placebo/practice effects in a 12-week, randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial. A long term comparative trial of penfluridol and fluphenazine decanoate in schizophrenic outpatients. Clinical, EEG mapping and psychometric studies in negative schizophrenia: comparative trials with amisulpride and fluphenazine. A 12-week, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial of donepezil adjunctive treatment to risperidone in chronic and stable schizophrenia. Lamotrigine in treatment-resistant schizophrenia: a randomized placebo-controlled crossover trial. One-year, low-dose neuroleptic study of in-patients with chronic schizophrenia characterised by persistent negative symptoms. Amisulpride v. haloperidol. Penfluridol (R 16341) as a maintenance therapy in chronic psychotic patients: a double-blind clinical evaluation. Safety evaluation of penfluridol, a new long-acting oral antipsychotic agent. Adjunctive varenicline treatment with antipsychotic medications for cognitive impairments in people with schizophrenia: a randomized double-blind placebo-controlled trial. Effects of donepezil adjunctive treatment to ziprasidone on cognitive deficits in schizophrenia: a double-blind, placebo-controlled study. Lithium augmentation fails to reduce symptoms in poorly responsive schizophrenic outpatients. Improvement of schizophrenic patients with primary negative symptoms treated with amisulpride. Amisulpride Study Group. ICI 204,636, an atypical antipsychotic: efficacy and safety in a multicenter, placebo-controlled trial in patients with schizophrenia. U.S. SEROQUEL Study Group.
Sixty patients meeting the criteria established for schizophrenia who attained a clinical plateau following hospital discharge were randomized to receive for one year either penfluridol, 20 to 160 mg orally once each week, or fluphenazine decanoate, 0.5 to 4 ml every two weeks. The relapse rate for both treatments was low and equal. The rate of recurrence of psychosis for patients receiving penfluridol was 7% and for those receiving fluphenazine decanoate 10%. A retrospective comparison of the penfluridol group was made to a similar group of patients assigned to placebo in an earlier study. Placebo-treated patients had a relapse rate of 68%. Penfluridol patients had statistically fewer psychotic relapses. Questions about the possible carcinogenicity of penfluridol in animals will have to be resolved before it can be widely used. This study demonstrates the feasibility of using an oral, long-acting antipsychotic agent. It would be a useful psychopharmacologic addition in the treatment of outpatient schizophrenics. Penfluridol is a diphenylbutylpiperdine derivative with a half-life of sixty-six (66) hours. The present study was designed to determine its efficacy for the maintenance of schizophrenia. In a 52 week double-blind study, once weekly doses of penfluridol were compared with once daily doses of chlorpromazine in 56 schizophrenic patients receiving maintenance treatment on an outpatient basis. Both drugs were similar in their clinical effectiveness; no major side effects occurred with either drug. Twenty eight chronic schizophrenics were assigned in a double blind fashion to treatment with penfluridol or placebo for a period of 12 weeks. The clinical picture including the side effects were monitored regularly, whenever the clinical picture deteriorated haloperidol in individually adjusted doses was added to the treatment regimen. By the end of the study 12 out of the 14 placebo patients required haloperidol as compared to only 1 of the 14 penfluridol patients. Evaluation of the results showed no significant differences between the two groups or between the baseline and the final ratings in each group. This trial has confirmed the previous reports that penfluridol is a suitable drug for maintenance therapy in schizophrenic patients. This study presents data on the use of penfluridol, a once-a-week orally administered, antipsychotic agent, in the treatment of chronic schizophrenic patients. Fifty-nine patients participated in the initial dose titration segment during which doses of penfluridol were adjusted weekly until the patients' condition became stabilized. The starting dose did not exceed 60 mg per week, and the maximum weekly dose did not exceed 140 mg. Forty-one of these patients continued on to participate in a double-blind comparison of penfluridol with chlorpromazine. Maximum doses did not exceed 140 mg per dose per week for penfluridol and 7350 mg per week for chlorpromazine in the double-blind segment. Patients were abruptly switched from their previous neuroleptic medication to penfluridol without loss of control. Side effects, mainly extrapyramidal in nature, were readily alleviated with benztropine mesylate. Penfluridol, administered orally once a week, appeared to be well tolerated; it was comparable to daily chlorpromazine in treating and maintaining schizophrenic patients. Fifty-six out of 60 schizophrenic patients completed a double-blind study of two long-acting neuroleptics, penfluridol (peroral) and flupenthixol decanoate (parenteral). Half of the patients were on maintenance therapy of flupenthixol prior to the study, the other half on penfluridol. The actual double-blind study (12 weeks) was commenced after a preliminary period of 4 weeks, the patients in the two main groups being randomly divided into two further groups, one continuing the medication unchanged, the other changing to the alternative drug. It was found possible to make a sudden switch from penfluridol to flupenthixol decanoate and vice versa without any significant change in the condition of the patient. The same dosage (in 70% of the patients from 40 to 80 mg) of penfluridol was used per week as was employed for flupenthixol decanoate per fortnight. Changes in the intensity of the symptoms (total Brief Psychiatric Rating Scale (BPRS) score) were moe pronounced in the preliminary period (during unchanged treatment) than on changed medication in the blind period. Both drugs induced approximately the same degree of akathisia, Parkinsonism and autonomic side effects. The practical consequences of equipotent therapeutical effect of a peroral and parenteral long-acting neuroleptic are briefly discussed. In a controlled trial of penfluridol and thiothixene as maintenance drugs in patients with chronic schizophrenic syndromes, some improvement over previous neuroleptics was seen with both drugs. This improvement was mainly evident in variables concerned with participation in social activities as assessed with the S-scale and by ward behaviour. The drug dosages necessary were very low and gave few and easily manageable side-effects. There was no significant difference between penfluridol and thiothixene. Penfluridol has the clear practical advantage of being the only long-acting drug for oral administration so far available. Twenty patients were treated with penfluridol and 21 with fluphenazine for a period of up to 1 year. Penfluridol, an oral neuroleptic administered weekly was as efficacious as fluphenazine administered twice daily and appeared to be superior to fluphenazine in improving emotional withdrawal and anergia. The low incidence of side effects and other signs of toxicity, coupled with an effective prophylactic activity, suggests that penfluridol is an important addition to our therapeutic armamentarium for the treatment of chronic schizophrenia. The clinical promise of penfluridol as a long-acting oral antipsychotic medication has led to a number of controlled studies designed to verify its usefulness. These studies have been reviewed and compared with a controlled study carried out by the authors. The data obtained from this study have tended to confirm the impression of previous investigators that penfluridol, administered in a dosage of 40 to 80 mg on a once-a-week basis in a single dose, compares favorably with the antipsychotic activity of those neuroleptics requiring administration on a daily basis. A double blind comparative study was conducted to evaluate the efficacy and safety of penfluridol and trifluoperazine in patients of chronic schizophrenia. Penfluridol was administered once weekly while trifluoperazine was administered twice daily by preparing identical capsules. The data revealed that both the compounds were similarly effective in maintaining control of symptoms of chronic schizophrenia. However, penfluridol has a definite advantage over trifluoperazine since it is administered once a week instead of twice a day. nan A controlled study was made of penfluridol medication consisting of a single weekly oral dose of 30 mg in 30 patients with acute psychoses of varying type and origin. This medication was found to be effective. No significant side effects occurred.Several long-acting neuroleptics for injection are now available. The development of an oral compound of this type is an asset because of the manageability of the oral drug in the hands of family doctors and social psychiatrists. This investigation is a 52-week double-blind study comparing the efficacy and safety of penfluridol and trifluoperazine in 25 chronic schizophrenic outpatients. Penfluridol was administered once weekly and trifluoperazine daily. Measurements were made at baseline, various fixed intervals during the study period and termination. The data reveals that both agents were similarly effective in maintaining control of the symptoms of chronic schizophrenic patients at a level commensurate with or better than that provided by their previous medication. Besides being effective, medications were also well tolerated. The side effects were characteristic of marketed neuroleptics. Akathisia was more common with penfluridol but readily controlled with anti-parkinsonian medication. Other side effects were similar in severity and occurrence between study-drug groups. Both agents had low autonomic liability, and neither agent was depressogenic. Altered expression of central muscarinic and nicotinic acetylcholine receptors in hippocampal and cortical regions may contribute to the cognitive impairment exhibited in patients with schizophrenia. Increasing cholinergic activity through the use of a cholinesterase inhibitor (ChEI) therefore represents a possible strategy for cognitive augmentation in schizophrenia. We examined the efficacy and safety of the ChEI donepezil as cotreatment for mild to moderate cognitive impairment in schizophrenia or schizoaffective disorder in a prospective, 12-week, placebo-controlled, double-blind, parallel-group study. In total, 250 patients (18-55 years) with schizophrenia or schizoaffective disorder who were clinically stabilized on risperidone, olanzapine, quetiapine, ziprasidone, or aripiprazole, alone or in combination, were enrolled at 38 outpatient psychiatric clinics in the United States. Patients were randomized to donepezil 5 mg q.d. for 6 weeks then 10 mg q.d. for 6 weeks, or placebo administered as oral tablets. The primary outcome measure was the Clinical Antipsychotic Trials of Intervention Effectiveness (CATIE) neurocognitive battery composite score. In the intent-to-treat sample (donepezil, n=121; placebo, n=124), both treatments showed improvement in the composite score from baseline to week 12. At week 12, cognitive improvement with donepezil was similar to that with placebo (last-observation-carried-forward effect size, 0.277 vs 0.411; p=0.1182) and statistically significantly inferior for the observed-cases analysis (0.257 vs 0.450; p=0.044). There was statistically significant improvement in the Positive and Negative Syndrome Assessment Scale negative symptoms score for placebo compared with donepezil, while total and positive symptom scores were similar between both treatments. Statistically significant improvements in positive symptoms score and Clinical Global Impression-Improvement for donepezil compared with placebo were noted at Week 6. Treatment-emergent adverse events (AEs) were observed for 54.5% of donepezil- and 61.3% of placebo-treated patients; most AEs were rated as mild to moderate in severity. Donepezil was safe and well-tolerated but was not effective compared with placebo as a cotreatment for the improvement of cognitive impairment in this patient population. A significant and surprisingly large placebo/practice effect was observed among placebo-treated patients, and is a serious consideration in future clinical trial study designs for potential cognitive enhancing compounds in schizophrenia. Penfluridol, a diphenylbutylpiperidene derivative, is a new long acting neuroleptic, administered orally, once weekly. It is marketed in several European countries and has been used successfully in the treatment of various acute psychoses, for severely ill chronic schizophrenic patients, and as maintenance therapy for chronic schizophrenic patients. The present study was designed to compare, in a double-blind fashion, the efficacy of penfluridol and fluphenazine decanoate in the maintenance therapy of schizophrenic outpatients. Based on recent quantitative EEG findings of increased slow activity in negative schizophrenia indicating organicity, it was hypothesized that neuroleptics decreasing delta/theta activity should be beneficial for schizophrenics with predominantly negative symptoms. Thus, a double-blind, clinical, psychometric and neurophysiological study was carried out in 40 hospitalized patients with unproductive schizophrenia (mean age: 31 years; ICD diagnoses: 295.0, 295.1 and 295.6) who were treated randomly either with the benzamide amisulpride (AMI; n = 19) or low doses of fluphenazine (FLU; n = 21). In the first 2 weeks the daily doses were 50 mg AMI or 2 mg FLU, respectively, from the third week on up to the sixth week 100 mg AMI and 4 mg FLU. Clinical evaluations, psychometry and EEG mapping were performed on day 1 (hours 0 and 4--acute effect), on day 14 (hour 0--subacute effect) and on day 42 (hours 0 and 4--chronic and superimposed effects). Three AMI patients discontinued therapy prematurely because of productive symptoms (days 14, 28 and 35), while in the FLU group 2 patients dropped out due to depressive symptoms (days 21, 28), 1 due to productive symptoms (day 35), 1 due to ineffectiveness (day 28), and 1 because of an akinetic crisis (day 6). Statistical evaluation demonstrated a significant improvement in the AMDP apathy and Andreasen SANS score in both groups with the patients remaining severely ill as rated by the CGI. FLU-treated patients needed significantly more anticholinergic medication than the AMI-treated group. Psychometric evaluation showed in regard to the noopsyche significant improvement after subacute, chronic and superimposed AMI, while FLU-treated patients showed significant improvement only after subacute treatment. AMI was significantly superior to FLU at the hours 0 and 4 of day 42. The thymopsyche improved after subacute, chronic and superimposed administration of both compounds with a significant superiority of AMI on days 14 and 42 (4 h postdrug). EEG mapping showed a decrease of delta/theta and increase of beta activity as well as an acceleration of the centroid after acute and superimposed AMI on day 42 as compared with baseline; FLU patients exhibited a decrease of delta/theta activity and an acceleration of the total centroid too, while alpha activity was augmented and beta activity tended to be reduced. Our study demonstrated that, in addition to the new benzamide AMI, FLU in low doses may also be regarded as a neuroleptic with activating properties and may be utilized in the treatment of schizophrenics with predominantly negative symptoms. There is considerable incentive to develop new treatment strategies that effectively target cognitive deficits in schizophrenia. One of the theoretically promising novel treatment candidates is acetylcholinesterase inhibitors that increase the synaptic levels of cholinergic, nicotinic, and muscarinic receptor activity. The purpose of this study was to assess the efficacy of donepezil as an adjuvant agent in the treatment of chronic schizophrenia in particular for cognitive impairments. This investigation was a 12-week, double-blind study of parallel groups of patients with stable chronic schizophrenia. Thirty patients were recruited from inpatient and outpatient departments, age ranging from 22 to 44 years. All participants met DSM-IV-TR. diagnostic criteria for schizophrenia. To be eligible, patients were required to have been treated with a stable dose of risperidone as their primary antipsychotic treatment for a minimum period of 8 weeks. The subjects were randomized to receive donepezil (10 mg/day) or placebo, in addition to risperidone (4-6 mg/day). Clinical psychopathology was assessed with Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale (PANSS). Cognition was measured by a cognitive battery. Patients were assessed by a psychiatrist at baseline and after 8, and 12 weeks after the medication started. The PANSS scores and cognitive performance were used as the outcome measures. The donepezil group had significantly greater improvement in the negative symptoms over the 12-week trial. There were no differences between the donepezil and placebo groups on any neurocognitive assessments at endpoint (week 12). The present study indicates donepezil as a potential adjunctive treatment strategy for negative symptoms of chronic schizophrenia. There is no evidence from randomized, controlled trials that demonstrate effectiveness for any pharmacological treatment in clozapine-resistant schizophrenia. Since the introduction of chlorpromazine, all antipsychotics with proven efficacy on positive symptoms have been dopamine antagonists, but recent experimental data suggest that ketamine-induced positive schizophreniform symptoms in healthy subjects can be controlled by a glutamate antagonist lamotrigine. The hypothesis tested was that lamotrigine is more effective than placebo in the treatment of positive schizophrenic symptoms when combined with clozapine.
                Thirty-four hospitalized treatment-resistant patients having chronic schizophrenia participated in a double-blind, placebo-controlled, 14-week, crossover trial where 200 mg/day lamotrigine was gradually added to their ongoing clozapine treatment. Clinical assessments were made by the Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale at the beginning and end of each treatment period.
                In intention-to-treat analysis, lamotrigine treatment was more effective in reducing positive (effect size.7, p =.009) and general psychopathological (effect size.6, p =.030) symptoms, whereas no improvement was observed in negative symptoms.
                These results provide the first evidence from a randomized controlled trial of an effective pharmacological treatment with an anticonvulsant agent in treatment-resistant schizophrenia and indicate that both positive and general psychopathological symptoms in patients with schizophrenia can be controlled by a drug that is not a dopamine antagonist. The results are in line with previous experimental data suggesting that excessive glutamate neurotransmission contributes to the positive symptoms of schizophrenia. Amisulpride is a potent substituted benzamide antipsychotic drug claimed to improve the negative symptoms of schizophrenia, particularly at low dosage.
                Sixty long-term in-patients with schizophrenia and selected for predominant negative symptoms were randomised to receive either haloperidol or amisulpride. Over a year there was systematic dose reduction, as symptoms allowed.
                There were no significant differences between the treatment groups in the proportion receiving low-dose treatment, the control of positive symptoms, or ratings of social behaviour, side-effects or tardive dyskinesia. For negative symptoms, there were consistent but non-significant trends in favour of amisulpride. The amisulpride patients required significantly less anticholinergic medication.
                In chronically-hospitalised in-patients with schizophrenia characterised by persistent negative symptoms, amisulpride was a well-tolerated maintenance antipsychotic medication. The drug had only a limited effect in reducing negative symptoms, which were relatively stable, enduring phenomena in this sample, despite dosage reduction. nan nan The aim of this study is to examine the effects of treatment with varenicline, a partial agonist at the α4β2 and full agonist at the α7 nicotine acetylcholine receptor, on cognitive impairments in people with schizophrenia. In all, 120 clinically stable people with schizophrenia participated in randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled 8-week trial. Antipsychotic and concomitant medication doses remained fixed throughout the study. Varenicline was titrated up to 1 mg twice daily for weeks 2-8. Neuropsychological, clinical, and safety assessments were administered at baseline and weeks 1, 2, 4, and 8. In the primary analyses of neurocognitive differences at week 8, no varenicline-placebo differences were significant. In secondary longitudinal analyses, varenicline improved compared with placebo on the Digital Symbol Substitution Test (p=0.013) and the Wisconsin Card Sorting Test non-perseverative errors (p=0.043). Some treatment effects were different between smokers and non-smokers. In smokers, Continuous Performance Test hit reaction time (p=0.008) and Stroop Interference (p=0.004) were reduced for varenicline compared with placebo, while there were no treatment differences in non-smokers. No significant treatment main effects or interactions were noted for total scores on the Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale or the Scale for the Assessment for Negative Symptoms. Our findings suggest beneficial effects of adjunctive varenicline treatment with antipsychotics for some cognitive impairments in people with schizophrenia. In some cases, effects of treatment varied between smokers and non-smokers. Further study is required to assess the functional significance of these changes. The objective of this study was to examine the effects of adjunctive treatment with the acetylcholinesterase inhibitor, donepezil, on cognitive deficits and psychopathology in schizophrenic patients treated with the antipsychotic, ziprasidone. The design of the study was double blind, placebo controlled, and longitudinal. Patients were treated with ziprasidone for 8 weeks, thereafter randomized to 4 months of double-blind adjunctive treatment with either donepezil (dose, 5-10 mg) or placebo. The severity of psychopathology (PANSS) and the cognitive deficits were examined at baseline and after 4 months. A total of 21 schizophrenic patients were enrolled, of whom 11 patients completed the trial (donepezil, n = 7; placebo, n = 4). There were no within- or between-group differences in changes on the Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale scores or a global cognitive score. Within-group improvements (all at trend level P = 0.07) were seen in the placebo group on Trail-Making Test B, immediate verbal recall, and set-shifting errors. The donepezil group showed a significant deterioration on planning efficiency (P = 0.04). Between-group differences were found between the lack of improvement in immediate verbal recall in the donepezil group and the improvement in the placebo group (P = 0.02), and between the deterioration of planning efficiency in the donepezil group and the stability in the placebo group (trend level, P = 0.07). Linear regression analyses showed that neither baseline psychopathology scores, baseline levels of cognitive deficits, nor psychopathology changes over time accounted for these changes in cognitive scores. The study found no evidence of improved cognition after treatment with donepezil, although the conclusions that can be drawn are limited by the small sample size. Nearly one third of patients suffering from schizophrenia do not fully respond to antipsychotic medication. Safe, effective, and cost-efficient methods to reduce symptoms are clearly needed; therefore, lithium as an adjunct to fluphenazine decanoate was tested in a placebo-controlled trial in outpatients who were part of the Treatment Strategies of Schizophrenia (TSS) study.
                Forty-one patients with DSM-III schizophrenia or schizoaffective disorder were assigned to either adjunctive lithium or placebo after at least 6 months of fluphenazine decanoate treatment to stabilize symptoms had failed. The trial was designed for 8 weeks of treatment, and patients assigned to placebo could afterward be administered lithium in an 8-week, open-label study.
                Assessment of the intent-to-treat analysis revealed no significant differences in demographic variables between the lithium and placebo groups. Although both groups showed significant (p = .00135) improvement as measured by total scores on the Brief Psychiatric Rating Scale (BPRS), there were no significant differences in response between the lithium and placebo groups. Patients originally treated with placebo added to neuroleptic did not have significantly greater improvement when receiving open-label adjunctive lithium.
                Although success with lithium augmentation therapy for persistent psychosis has been reported in the past, this study of well-characterized patients showed no benefit for this common strategy, thus indicating that care be used in utilizing lithium augmentation. The goal of this placebo-controlled study was to evaluate the efficacy and safety of low doses of amisulpride, an atypical antipsychotic of the benzamide class with high affinity for D2 and D3 dopamine receptors, in the treatment of schizophrenic patients with predominantly primary negative symptoms.
                After completion of a 4-week washout period, schizophrenic patients with primary negative symptoms participated in a 12-week, multicenter double-blind trial of placebo (N = 83), amisulpride, 50 mg/day (N = 84), or amisulpride, 100 mg/day (N = 75). They were evaluated with the Scale for the Assessment of Negative Symptoms, the Scale for the Assessment of Positive Symptoms, the Brief Psychiatric Rating Scale, and the Montgomery-Asberg Depression Rating Scale.
                Both amisulpride treatment groups showed significantly greater improvement in negative symptoms than the placebo group. Positive symptom scores were low at baseline and changed minimally during the study, suggesting that the improvement in negative symptoms was independent of improvement in positive symptoms. The safety of amisulpride was comparable to that of placebo, and extrapyramidal symptoms were infrequent. Comparable efficacy and safety results were observed with either dose of amisulpride.
                These findings confirm and extend those of earlier placebo-controlled studies of low-dose amisulpride in the treatment of patients with predominantly negative symptoms of schizophrenia. ICI 204,636 is a new, potentially atypical antipsychotic. In early phase II trials, the antipsychotic was well tolerated and results suggested efficacy in the treatment of the positive and negative symptoms of schizophrenia. The efficacy and safety of ICI 204,636 were evaluated on a larger scale in a 6-week, multicenter, double-blind trial. Hospitalized patients who met DSM-III-R criteria for chronic or subchronic schizophrenia with acute exacerbation, as well as other criteria, were randomized to ICI 204,636 (75 to 750 mg daily) (N = 54) or placebo (N = 55). Patients were assessed weekly by use of the Brief Psychiatric Rating Scale (BPRS), Scale for the Assessment of Negative Symptoms (SANS), and Clinical Global Impression Scale (CGI) for efficacy and the Simpson Scale and Abnormal Involuntary Movement Scale for extrapyramidal side effects (EPS). Significant differences (p < or = 0.05) between treatment groups, which favored ICI 204,636, were identified throughout the trial. Endpoint differences were significant (by analysis of covariance) for BPRS factor IV (activation) and SANS scores and were marginally significant for total BPRS, BPRS factor III (thought disturbance), BPRS positive-symptom cluster, and CGI Severity of Illness item scores (p = 0.07, 0.09, 0.06, and 0.09, respectively). ICI 204,636 was well tolerated, although it was associated with mild transient increases in alanine aminotransferase and a higher incidence of somnolence and anticholinergic effects compared with placebo. In the dose range studied, treatment with ICI 204,636 did not induce EPS as determined by analysis of Simpson Scale total scores and lack of treatment-emergent acute dystonic reactions. Furthermore, ICI 204,636 did not produce sustained levels of prolactin; the mean change from baseline at endpoint (-7.2 micrograms/L) was comparable (p = 0.44) to that for placebo (-8.2 micrograms/L). These findings distinguish ICI 204,636 from standard antipsychotics and confirm preclinical predictions that ICI 204,636 is an atypical antipsychotic.
Although there are shortcomings and gaps in the data, there appears to be enough overall consistency for different outcomes. The efficacy and adverse effects profile of penfluridol are similar to other typical antipsychotics; both oral and depot. Furthermore, penfluridol is shown to be an adequate treatment option for people with schizophrenia, especially those who do not respond to oral medication on a daily basis and do not adapt well to depot drugs. One of the results favouring penfluridol was a lower drop out rate in medium term when compared to depot medications. It is also an option for chronic sufferers of schizophrenia with residual psychotic symptoms who nevertheless need continuous use of antipsychotic medication. An additional benefit of penfluridol is that it is a low-cost intervention.
Note: the eight citations in the awaiting classification section of the review may alter the conclusions of the review once assessed.