View clinical trials related to Schizophrenia.
Filter by:The goals of this study are to replicate previous findings of genetic predictors of response to clozapine and other antipsychotic drugs.
Lately researchers and clinicians have emphasized the health related quality of life. Several reasons account for this trend. First of all, the advanced medical practices have contributed to the increased life expectancy. Secondly, the pattern of diseases has shifted from high acuity to chronicity. Therefore, the effectiveness of health care could not be solely evaluated by the rates of morbidity and mortality. The state of patients’ quality of life has become the pivotal indicator of the effectiveness of health care interventions. On the other hand, patients’ subjective perceptions of health care are crucial factors in treatment processes. Therefore quality of life becomes reference in choosing health care interventions to enhance the benefits of patients. The scopes of quality of life research include the essence of quality of life, the measurements of quality of life and the relationships between quality of life and its related factors, etc. The local researchers have long put efforts in quality of life research. The results of these studies have contributed to the understandings of different patients’ quality of life. However, the majority of studies have focused on specific diseases. This study propose to extend the scope of quality of life research to study patients’ quality of life of two severe illnesses, i.e. HIV infections and schizophrenia. These two illnesses represent two severe physical and psychiatric illnesses. Even their etiology, mechanisms, disease process, signs and symptoms, and treatments are different. However, the similarities of these two illnesses include both are severe illnesses without cure, both are stigmatized by the society. Patients with these two illnesses suffer in their personal lives, social relations and quality of life. Therefore the current study to further investigate and compare and contrast the essence of patients’ quality of life and their related factors. The proposed study is a second year study of the two-year study - The quality of life of patients with severe illnesses (NSC93-2314-B-002-294). The first year study focused on the investigation of the quality of life of patients with HIV infections (NSC93-2314-B-002-294). The aim of this proposed study is to compare and contrast the quality of life and its related factors of patients with schizophrenia and HIV infections. The contributions of this study include the in-depth understandings of quality of life of patients with HIV infections and schizophrenia and the comparison of quality of life of different illnesses. The results serve as the foundations in future development of intervention programs to enhance patients’ quality of life and cost-effectiveness analyses.
Schizophrenia is a severe mental illness, which has a prodromal phase of 1-2 years prior to the onset of the illness. During the prodromal phase, patients might show maladaptation and/or poor social functioning. However, these early symptom of schizophrenia might be overlooked by patients and their families. At that period, patients might strive to improve their social interactions and social functioning. However, the efforts might further create their stress level on everyday life, which can actually accelerate the illness onset of schizophrenia. In other words, the efforts would worsen the pathophysiologic changes in the brain, which can result in the positive symptoms of schizophrenia. Previous researches found that the critical period for treatment of schizophrenia is the early phase of illness onset, especially the first two or three years. Delay treatment would worsen the illness. To this extent, early treatment would bring to a better prognosis as well as minimize the costs of individuals, families and society. In other words, early interventions not only can prevent relapse, it also can benefit patients’ psychosocial adjustments. However, researches found that the average duration of untreated psychosis is 25.2 months in Taiwan, which indicates the phenomena of delay treatment and this trend might result in missing the critical treatment period. This is a two years study aiming to establish an early intervention program for patients with schizophrenia. In the first year, it aims to understand the phenomena of psychiatric care services utilization for patients with schizophrenia, special emphasis will be on the delay treatment and pluralistic health seeking process. In the second year, it aims to establish an early intervention program. The results of this research would contribute to in-service trainings, service providing, and policy making of psychiatric services.
Persons with schizophrenia experience imaginary voices, visions and disorganized thoughts, and are handicapped when it comes to social life, which is detrimental to the affected individuals and the community. Although the pathogenesis of this mental disease has not been clearly elucidated, much evidence suggests that inheritance is of major etiological importance and multiple genetic components are implicated. Previous linkage studies of familial schizophrenia have led to the successful identification of numerous susceptibility loci covering many of the human chromosomes, including chromosome 1q, 5q, 6p22, 6p24, 8q21, 13q32, 15q13-14 and 22q11, etc. Necessities for further identification of candidate genes involved in familial schizophrenia by taking a genome-wide approach are listed as follows: 1. given that multiple genes are responsible for this disease, it is of critical interest to view the complete molecular profiling of schizophrenia's genome; 2. identification of promising schizophrenia candidate genes by genome-wide scanning will facilitate the development of molecular markers and provide a more objective and effective assessment method in psychotic diagnosis and prognosis; 3. prevention of the onset of this disorder will be improved by early classification of individuals bearing strong genetic loading for schizophrenia as a high risk population; 4. making a breakthrough into the investigation of schizophrenia pathogenesis by the characterization of susceptible genes found by genome-wide exploring. Array-based comparative genomic hybridization (CGH) allows high-throughput genome-wide survey for DNA copy number aberrations, providing a powerful tool for investigating genetic disorders and for developing diagnostic and therapeutic targets. Arrays used in this study consist of approximately 43,000 60-mer oligonucleotide probes that span coding and noncoding regions of the whole human genome with an average spatial resolution of around 35 kb. Furthermore, the sensitivity of these arrays is capable of detecting and mapping regions of single-copy losses, homozygous deletions, and amplicons of various sizes even when using full-complexity genomic samples. In this study, the investigators will conduct an array-based comparative genomic hybridization (CGH) with genomic DNA of many affected members from "schizophrenia families" (the investigators classified families according to the presence or absence of two or more affected members) to identify a set of candidate genes associated with this disease. It is hoped that the results obtained from this study will improve the accuracy and efficiency of psychotic treatment.
This project entitled “A Study on Risk Mutations of the Vulnerability Genes of Schizophrenia” (RIGOS) is a continuous effort following the well founded and arduous work of genetic study on schizophrenia (SCH) by the Genomic Psychiatry Study Group (GENOP) of National Taiwan University Hospital. So far the GENOP has established several important data banks, including DNA bank and lymphoblastoid (EVB transformed) cell bank of 725 affected sib-pair SCH families, 200 Trio SCH families, and 150 normal controls; and the clinical database of serial follow-ups. An ongoing project, Positional Cloning Study on the Vulnerability Genes of SCH (POCOS), carried out by the GENOP has found 11 candidate vulnerability genes with identified expression in the brain. Besides, on the basis of two related projects, the Multiple Psychopathological Study of SCH (MPSS) and the Etiological Study on SCH (SEFOS), the GENOP has established endophotype indicators for schizophrenia in neuropsychological and neurophysiological domains. The GENOP, a multidisciplinary research team, is thus ready to search for risk mutations of the candidate vulnerability genes for schizophrenia in this new proposal. The basic strategy of this RIGOS Project is to search for risk mutations, based on case-control design with sufficient statistical power, and then to validate these risk mutations by convergent evidence of genetic epidemiological analyses, functional variation studies using in vitro cell line experiments, microarray study, and neurophysiological study (PPI) on mice model. Thus, this RIGOS Project has integrated 5 lines of experimental designs to achieve 5 specific aims to identify and validate the risk mutations from 11 candidate vulnerability genes found in the ongoing POCOS project based on Taiwanese Sample. We are confident to be at the frontier work of searching for the risk mutations, with functional validity, of SCH. The achievement of the RIGOS will be a mile stone to create new era of genetic functional study to tackle pathophysiological mechanism of SCH and will be the basis of developing novel diagnostic method and novel intervention method at the early stage of SCH in the future.
In this proposed study, we aim to investigate the effects of Bexarotene (Targretin; LGD1069; 4-[1-{5,6,7,8-tetrahydro-3,5,5,8,8-pentamethyl-2-naphthalenyl} ethenyl] benzoic acid) on severity of psychopathology, cognitive impairment, and quality of life in schizophrenia patients in an open label trial. The rationale behind add-on oral bexarotene to ongoing antipsychotic treatment in schizophrenia patients is based on both the retinoid dysregulation hypothesis (Goodman, 1995) and the growth factors deficiency and synaptic destabilization hypothesis (Moises et al, 2002) of schizophrenia. In this clinical trial, a novel regimen of low dose bexarotene (Targretin, 75 mg/day) will be added for 6 weeks to the standard treatment of 15 schizophrenia patients on stable antipsychotic treatment. Participants will be assessed at baseline and after 2, 4 and 6 weeks of treatment. A battery of research instruments will be used for assessment of efficacy and safety (psychopathology, and side effects). In addition, cholesterol and triglyceride levels, liver and thyroid function tests and a blood cell count will be monitored at baseline and during therapy.
The goal of the present study is to evaluate the effect of D-serine, added to antipsychotic treatment, on negative and cognitive symptoms in schizophrenia. The investigators are hypothesizing that D-serine will improve cognitive functioning and negative symptoms.
This is an in vivo positron emission tomography (PET) study of regional cerebral dopamine and blood flow in normal volunteers, persons with Parkinson s disease (both familial and sporadic), and those with schizophrenia spectrum disorders. The latter also sign consent for NIH approved protocol 89-M-0160, "Inpatient Evaluation of Neuropsychiatric Patients," PI: Daniel Eisenberg, M.D. Using PET with 6-[F-18] Fluoro-L-dopa (FDOPA) and (15)0-H2O in a single scan session, both presynaptic dopaminergic function and regional cerebral blood flow (rCBF) are assessed. The kinetic rate constant (Ki) for presynaptic dopaminergic uptake in striatum and other regions is calculated. We compare Ki across subject groups and relate the findings to rCBF. Findings are also related to allelic variation in genes of interest, for determination of which participants sign separate consent for NIH approved protocol 95-M-0150 Neurobiological Investigation of Patients with Schizophrenia Spectrum Disorders and Their Siblings, PI: Karen F. Berman, MD. We also draw comparisons between subjects with inherited vs. sporadic Parkinson s disease to determine whether the PET phenotype is the same in both groups, and we compare system-level, circuit-based pathophysiology across PD and schizophrenia groups. Each subject is further screened with an MRI to rule out structural abnormalities and also to further delineate areas of interest in the PET scans.
The overall purpose of this research is to look at how two of the most commonly prescribed newer antipsychotic medications, risperidone and olanzapine, affect substances in the body such as glucose and insulin. Undesirable changes in blood sugar control, or glucose regulation, and type 2 diabetes can occur more commonly in individuals with schizophrenia compared to healthy subjects and subjects with other psychiatric conditions. While abnormalities in glucose regulation were first reported in schizophrenia before the introduction of antipsychotic medications, antipsychotic treatment may contribute significantly to abnormalities in glucose regulation. Attention to the way that antipsychotic medications may affect glucose regulation has increased as doctors have become more concerned in general about disease- and drug-related medical complications, including weight gain during antipsychotic treatment.
The purpose of this study is to use brain imaging technology to compare differences in brain structure, chemistry, and functioning in individuals with brain and mental disorders compared to healthy volunteers. Schizophrenia is a brain disorder that results from subtle changes and abnormalities in neurons. These deficits likely occur in localized regions of the brain and may result in widespread, devastating consequences. The neuronal abnormalities are inherited through a complex combination of genetic and environmental factors. Brain imaging technologies can be used to better characterize brain changes in individuals with schizophrenia. This study will use magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans to identify predictable, quantifiable abnormalities in neurophysiology, neurochemistry and neuroanatomy that characterize schizophrenia and other neurological and neuropsychiatric disorders.