Neuroleptic non-compliance remains a serious challenge for the treatment of psychosis. Non-compliance is predominantly attributed to side effects, lack of illness insight, reduced well-being or poor therapeutic alliance. However, other still neglected factors may also play a role. Further, little is known about whether psychiatric patients without psychosis who are increasingly prescribed neuro...

BACKGROUND Even at the first episode of psychosis, high expressed emotion (EE) characterises over half of patient-carer relationships. This study compared a carer appraisal model of EE with the ability of illness factors to predict EE at the first episode. AIMS To investigate the utility of a carer appraisal model of EE in first-episode psychosis. METHOD We compared high- and low-EE carers ...

BACKGROUND Several recent studies have reported that serious violence towards self and others is more common in the first episode of psychosis than after treatment. AIM To estimate the proportion of survivors of suicide attempts during psychotic illness by jumping from a height who had not previously received treatment with antipsychotic medication. METHODS An audit of the medical records o...

The relatively new method of autoethnography as valid research is used in this paper. combines a personal and introspective approach with the academic method. By reflecting on her experience psychosis, first author (LF) attempts to show how psychotic symptoms, such delusions or paranoid perceptions, have symbolic meaning could relate previous traumatic experiences. She uses Winnicott’s concept ...

A case of recurrent pre and postpartum psychosis is described. Pre-partum psychosis was more severe in intensity when compared with postpartum psychosis and, if untreated, it may have continued as postpartum psychosis. Presence of bipolar affective illness in the family, ongoing stressor and unplanned pregnancy may be the risk factors for developing pregnancy- related psychosis. This case repor...

In general, psychotic symptomatology falls within the major categories of mental disorders such as schizophrenia, affective disorder and organic mental disorder. Those that do not fit the proposed diagnostic criteria for the aforementioned disorders are usually classified under the DSM-IH diagnosis of atypical psychosis. In the eastern culture, such symptoms are accepted as part of the cultural...

INTRODUCTION Anti-N-methyl-D-aspartate receptor (anti-NMDAR) encephalitis is a rare, newly defined autoimmune clinical entity that presents with atypical clinical manifestations. Most patients with anti-N-methyl-D-aspartate receptor encephalitis develop a progressive illness from psychosis into a state of unresponsiveness, with catatonic features often associated with abnormal movements and aut...

Recurrent episodes of psychosis, mania, or depression have been shown to be potentially neuro­ degenerative and associated with neurotoxicity due to neuroinflamma­ tion, reactive oxygen and nitrogen species, and apoptosis. This neuro­ degeneration leads to neural tissue loss and decrease in brain function. Ideally, psychopharmacologic man­ agement must not only stabilize clinical symptoms, but ...

OBJECTIVE The authors examined the duration of untreated psychosis, defined as the interval from first psychotic symptom to first psychiatric hospitalization, in a county-wide sample of first-admission inpatients who had received no previous antipsychotic medication. Differences between diagnostic groups in 24-month illness course and clinical outcomes as well as relationships between outcomes ...