The antipsychotic drugs don’t work for anorexia nervosa

Refusing pills

Helen Bould appraises a recent meta-analysis of second-generation antipsychotics for anorexia nervosa, which finds that the drugs don’t lead to weight gain or improve eating disorder symptoms. So why are antipsychotics being used in this group of patients?

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Switching antipsychotics in schizophrenia: the OPTiMiSE RCT

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Tracey Roberts summarises a recent paper that reviews the existing literature concerned with switching antipsychotics in patients with schizophrenia, and goes on to present the ongoing OPTiMiSE RCT in this field, which is due to be published in 2016.

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The more psychotic you are, the more benefit there is in taking antipsychotics

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John Baker reviews a recent participant-level meta-analysis of six placebo-controlled studies, which looks at the initial severity of schizophrenia and the efficacy of antipsychotics including Olanzapine, Risperidone and Amisulpride.

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Lithium is less expensive than olanzapine in treatment-resistant depression, but has unclear clinical benefits

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Treatment-resistant depression (TRD) still represents a challenge to psychiatric practice. Since patients have usually failed at least two antidepressants, drugs originally prescribed for other conditions are often tried as an augmentation (Souery er al., 2006). Amongst them, lithium (a mood-stabiliser used in the treatment of bipolar disorders) as well as atypical antipsychotics (AAPs, indicated for [read the full story…]

What was the respective effectiveness of olanzapine vs. risperidone in treating aggressive behaviours in adults with learning disability?

Argument

  New generation anti-psychotic medications are being used to treat aggressive behaviours in people with learning disabilities, whether or not individuals have a formal diagnosis of a mental health problem. This study set out to evaluate the effectiveness of two such new generation anti-psychotic medications, olanzapine and risperidone. The study looked at how effective these [read the full story…]