The relationship between the Global Assessment of Functioning (GAF) with other scales in schizophrenia has rarely been investigated. A systematic literature search was conducted to identify articles that reported the GAF score together with scores in the Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale (PANSS), Clinical Global Impression (CGI) or Brief Psychiatric Rating Scale (BPRS), using MEDLINE, EMBASE...

OBJECTIVE Chronic arsenic poisoning (Arsenicosis) is a global health risk, and it has been reported to improve the fitness, especially in altitudinal sickness in therapeutic dose. Scarcity of systematic study on psychiatric co-morbidities in Arsenicosis motivated us to conduct this research. The aim of this study was to estimate the co-morbid psychiatric disorders in patients with arsenicosis a...

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE Zotepine is claimed to be a neuroleptic drug with atypical features. However, there have been few double-blind studies in Asian patients. The purpose of this study was to compare the efficacy and safety of zotepine and haloperidol in Taiwanese patients with schizophrenia. PATIENTS AND METHODS Patients with positive symptoms (n = 70) were enrolled into this double-blind,...

BACKGROUND Autonomic nervous system (ANS) dysfunction and reduced heart rate variability (HRV) have been reported in a wide variety of psychiatric disorders, but have not been well characterized in bipolar mania. We recorded cardiac activity and assessed HRV in acutely hospitalized manic bipolar (BD) and schizophrenia (SCZ) patients compared to age- and gender-matched healthy comparison (HC) su...

Background. Impaired cognitive functions in schizophrenia are the major deciding factors in response to treatment. Conventional antipsychotics have minimal impact on cognitive dysfunctions and are associated with adverse effects. Atypical antipsychotics have shown promise in treatment of cognitive and negative symptoms of schizophrenia. Efforts are underway to find out the best drug amongst aty...

BACKGROUND The etiology of schizophrenia is not precisely known; however, mitochondrial function and cerebral energy metabolism abnormalities were determined to be possible factors associated with the etiology of schizophrenia. Impaired mitochondrial function negatively affects neuronal plasticity, and can cause cognitive deficits and behavioral abnormalities observed during the clinical course...

The aim of this study was to evaluate the efficacy and side effects of zuclopenthixol acetate compared with haloperidol in the management of the acutely disturbed schizophrenic patient. Suitable subjects diagnosed as having schizophreniform disorder or acute exacerbation of schizophrenia admitted to the psychiatric wards Hospital Kuala Lumpur were randomised to receive either zuclopenthixol ace...

PURPOSE Only a few studies have commented on the use of atypical antipsychotics for the treatment of Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) features, including affective dysregulation and aggression. We aimed at evaluating both efficacy and safety of quetiapine in a sample of consecutive BPD patients. GENERAL METHODS 29 BPD outpatients entered, and 23 completed, a 12 week, open-label, regime o...