Active clinical trials for "Schizophrenia"

The main object of this study is to evaluate the efficacy of equine assisted therapy on substantial and so far unsatisfactorily treatable symptom complexes in patients with schizophrenia.

This study will examine the effects of rTMS on the negative and positive symptoms of schizophrenia using 2 treatments in sequence applied to related brain areas.

Cognitive deficits have been shown to have negative impact on social functioning and functional goals such as ability to work and perform daily tasks in people with schizophrenia. There is evidence that Cognitive Remediation Therapy, a form of psychological therapy, is effective in improving cognition and functioning but there is still a limited understanding of what influence people's different response to this therapy. A tailored treatment is likely to be more effective because it will adapt to service users' unique characteristics. The investigators are planning a study exploring at the feasibility and acceptability of novel form of Cognitive Remediation Therapy which is personalised (pCRT) to the person individual characteristics. The personalised therapy will consist of task practice using computerized Cognitive Remediation software (i.e. called CIRCuiTS). The knowledge gathered in this work will contribute to develop the next generation of personalised treatment approaches for people with schizophrenia.

The primary objective of this pragmatic clinical trial (Main Study) was to assess the difference between all-cause hospitalizations in participants using Abilify MyCite versus virtual matched controls. In addition, secondary and exploratory objectives were to assess medication adherence, healthcare utilization and costs, and patient-reported outcomes.

Many individuals with schizophrenia struggle with auditory verbal hallucinations (AVHs). In some cases, these AVHs can be resistant to medication treatment. Previous research has found that transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) can be helpful in treating symptoms in individuals with other psychiatric disorders, such as depression. This study will assess if tDCS is effective in treating AVHs in individuals with schizophrenia. tDCS is a non-invasive form of brain stimulation which uses a weak current to temporarily excite or inhibit underlying cortical regions with small electrodes placed on the scalp. tDCS has been found to improve mental processes, including attention and memory function. In addition to examining the effect of tDCS on AVHs, this study will assess the effects of tDCS on mood as well as brain electrical activity with electroencephalogram (EEG) recordings. As an additional component, participants will be invited to participate in neuroimaging. Using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), brain activity and structure will be examined before and after tDCS. tDCS will be administered twice daily for 5 consecutive days for a total of 10 sessions. These study findings will contribute to the understanding of the impact of tDCS on AVHs, and will also increase knowledge of sound and memory/cognitive processing in individuals with schizophrenia.

The aim of this study is to test a therapeutic intervention to reduce negative symptomatic among schizophrenia patients. Since the intervention can take place within an inpatient stay, it is a short intervention. Three appointments are made with the patients within two weeks. With an adaptation of the Autobiographical Memory Test (AMT) participants will be asked to recall events from the past and to imagine future events. Patients are additionally asked to complete tasks between the sessions. One pre- and one post-measurement of negative symptoms, motives, level of functioning, hope for recovery and other co-variables are part of the study. A follow-up appointment four weeks later is intended to provide information on the longer-term impact.

The purpose of this study is to test whether administration of levetiracetam (LEV), a commonly used anti-epileptic that alters neurotransmitter release, can reduce hippocampal hyperactivity. Specifically, we will utilize two functional magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) techniques: 1) blood oxygen level dependence (BOLD) contrast will assess activity with a visual scene processing task that engages the anterior hippocampus and 2) arterial spin labeling (ASL) will assess baseline activity. This study will also assess whether patients have improvement in their symptoms after receiving LEV. Previous studies in people with psychotic disorders have shown that the hippocampus is hyperactive and more activity correlates with worsening of clinical symptoms. Therefore, the aim of this study is to use an intervention to further understand the underlying mechanisms of the hippocampus in psychosis.

The primary goal of the present study is to evaluate the utility of mGluR5 binding as measured by PET as biomarker of the CNTNAP2 mutation and related mTOR kinase pathway dysregulation.

Background: Cognitive deficits are a core symptom of schizophrenia even at the early stages of psychosis. To date, there has been reliable evidence that cognitive deficits are associated with outcomes in schizophrenia and early treatment could help to reduce the prominent disabling cognitive symptomatology which most schizophrenia patients still experience persistently. Outcomes in studies of repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation in schizophrenia patients suggest the possibility that application of transcranial direct-current stimulation (tDCS) with inhibitory stimulation over the left temporo-parietal cortex and excitatory stimulation over the left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex could affect positive and negative symptoms, respectively. Positive effects of tDCS have also been reported on cognitive symptoms. The present study protocol hypothesis is that the development and utilization of potentially effective neuroenhancement tools such as a non-invasive brain stimulation technique like tDCS for the treatment and rehabilitation of cognitive impairment in early stages of Schizophrenia may contribute to the elucidation of the nature of the complex and dynamic processes in the brain during the early stages of the disease, and may lead to a better outcome. Objectives: The aim of the present study protocol is to evaluate the efficacy of tDCS in the treatment of cognitive symptomatology in the early stages of psychosis. Methods: Sixty patients in the early stages of psychosis will be randomly allocated to receive 20 minutes of active 2-mA tDCS or sham stimulation once a day on 10 consecutive weekdays. The anode will be placed over the left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex and the cathode over the left temporo-parietal cortex. Neuropsychological and psychiatric assessments will be performed at the time of consent (baseline), at 1 and 3 months following the end of the intervention (maintenance effect).

This multi-centre study will evaluate the clinical efficacy of 3 atypical antipsychotics treatment in Chinese Patients with Schizophrenia by comparing model-decision with real-world psychiatrist-decision. The three atypical antipsychotics are olanzapine (5-20 milligram per day), risperidone (2-6 milligram per day) and aripiprazole (5-30 milligram per day). The main purpose of this study is to explore the potential difference between modal-aided-decision with clinician-decision in order to validate and optimize the selection model that has been established in advance. The efficacy evaluations include symptoms, social function, recurrence rate and hospitalization. Visits occurs at 0, 4, 8, 13, 26, 52 weeks.