Dr. Armand Hausmann – Ihr Psychiater in Innsbruck
Depression in Patients with Schizophrenia
Publikationen (Erstautor oder Mitautor) von Univ.-Prof. Dr. Armand Hausmann
Depression is a common comorbid syndrome in patients with schizophrenia. A review of the literature highlights the multitude of different expressions used to describe depression in this context. This fact exemplifies the diagnostic and ther apeutic inconsistencies found in literature. Former generations of psychiatrists considered that antidepressants could pro voke psychotic symptoms. Although the evidence is still tentative, it appears to be current common practice for most psychiatrists, having ruled out confounding conditions such as extrapyramidal motor symptoms and negative symptoms, to prescribe antidepressant agents to patients who show depressive symptoms. There are controlled clinical trials that have demonstrated that tricyclic antidepressants are effective in the treatment of depression in patients with schizophrenia. In contrast, the newer antidepressants have yet to be tested in large scale controlled studies. Possible interactions between antipsychotics and antidepressants must be considered when these two classes of agent are prescribed. Monotherapy with novel antipsychotics may be a treatment option, as some such as zotepine, olanzapine and risperidone have shown advantages over traditional antipsychotics in reducing depressive symptoms in patients with schizophrenia. Others have some pharmacological properties that resemble antidepressant drugs
Autoren: Armand Hausmann and W. Wolfgang Fleischhacker
