Study: Clozapine may have saved schizophrenics

July 13, 2009 By MARIA CHENG , AP Medical Writer

(AP) -- Thousands of people with schizophrenia worldwide could have been saved if doctors had prescribed them the anti-psychotic drug clozapine, a new study says.

Clozapine was introduced in the 1970s, but was banned for about a decade because of a rare but potentially deadly side effect: up to 2 percent of patients lose their white blood cells while taking the drug.

It was brought back to the market in the 1980s with warnings about its use, and is sold generically as Clozaril, Leponex, Denzapine, Fazaclo, among other names.

In most developed countries, guidelines recommend clozapine only as a last resort, if patients have already tried two other drugs but still aren't better.

In a study examining the death rates of about 67,000 in Finland versus those of the general population between 1996 and 2006, Jari Tiihonen, of the University of Kuopio in Finland, and colleagues found that patients on clozapine had the lowest risk of dying, compared to other patients with schizophrenia. The study was published online Monday in the medical journal, .

James MacCabe, a consultant psychiatrist at the National Psychosis Unit at South London and Maudsley Hospital, called the research "striking and shocking." He was not linked to the study.

"There is now a case to be made for revising the guidelines to make clozapine available to a much larger proportion of patients," he said.

Tiihonen and colleagues found that even though the use of anti-psychotic medications has jumped in the last decade, people with schizophrenia in Finland still die about two decades earlier than other people.

The researchers concluded that newer drugs including quetiapine, haloperidol and risperidone increased the death risk by 41 percent, 37 percent and 34 percent respectively, when compared to older drugs. In contrast, patients on clozapine had a 26 percent lower chance of dying. The study was paid for by Finland's Ministry of Health and Welfare.

Experts said the Finnish findings could be extrapolated to most other developed countries. MacCabe suggested doctors might give their schizophrenic patients clozapine after trying one other drug, as opposed to two.

MacCabe said clozapine is particularly effective in reducing suicidal tendencies in schizophrenic patients, in whom suicides account for about 40 percent of unexpected deaths.

"We should find ways to get more people on this medicine," said Lydia Chwastiak of the department of psychiatry at Yale University, who was not connected to the research. A study at the University of Maryland found that African-American patients in particular are treated less often with clozapine.

"If this drug can help people live longer, we need to look seriously at the barriers to using it," she said.

Tiihonen said the pharmaceutical industry is partly to blame for why clozapine has often been overlooked. "Clozapine's patent expired long ago, so there's no big money to be made from marketing it," he said.

---

On the Net:

http://www.lancet.com

©2009 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Filter


Move the slider to adjust rank threshold, so that you can hide some of the comments.


Display comments: newest first

magpies
Jul 13, 2009

Rank: 1 / 5 (5)
Why cant we just get these people off the earth???
RFC
Jul 13, 2009

Rank: 5 / 5 (6)
Magpies, we haven't been able to find a way to get ignorant dolts like you "off the earth." And abysmal stupidity is far more destructive and difficult to treat than schizophrenia.

Seriously, you should stop reading these articles. They may be a threat to your narrow-minded bigotry. You're spouting off now, but if you keep reading, you might activate some brain cells that may inadvertently cause you to think and, god forbid, feel.

gmurphy
Jul 13, 2009

Rank: not rated yet
magpies 0, RFC 1, stay tuned
getgoa
Jul 13, 2009

Rank: not rated yet
Schizophrenia is a disease or a mental illness?--
The previous article that says white matter in the brain does not grow in schizophenics is basically saying that schizophrenia is a disease of the brain not an "illness".
Rank 5 /5 (3 votes)
Relevant PhysicsForums posts

More news stories

FDA-approved drug rapidly clears amyloid from the brain, reverses Alzheimer's symptoms in mice

Neuroscientists at Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine have made a dramatic breakthrough in their efforts to find a cure for Alzheimer's disease. The researchers' findings, published in the journal Science, show t ...

Medicine & Health / Neuroscience

created Feb 09, 2012 | popularity 4.9 / 5 (53) | comments 21 | with audio podcast

Green tea found to reduce disability in the elderly

(Medical Xpress) -- A lot of research has been done over the past several years looking into the health benefits of green tea. As a result, scientists have found that regular consumption of the beverage leads ...

Medicine & Health / Health

created Feb 07, 2012 | popularity 4.4 / 5 (14) | comments 11 | with audio podcast report

Teen school drop-outs three times as likely to be on benefits in later life

Teen school drop-outs are almost three times as likely to be on benefits in later life as their peers who complete their schooling, indicates research published online in the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health.

Medicine & Health / Health

created Feb 06, 2012 | popularity not rated yet | comments 12

To perform with less effort, practice beyond perfection

Whether you are an athlete, a musician or a stroke patient learning to walk again, practice can make perfect, but more practice may make you more efficient, according to a surprising new University of Colorado Boulder study.

Medicine & Health / Neuroscience

created Feb 09, 2012 | popularity 4.4 / 5 (15) | comments 6 | with audio podcast

Anyone can learn to be more inventive, cognitive researcher says

There will always be a wild and unpredictable quality to creativity and invention, says Anthony McCaffrey, a cognitive psychology researcher at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, because an "Aha moment" is rare and ...

Medicine & Health / Psychology & Psychiatry

created Feb 09, 2012 | popularity 4.6 / 5 (11) | comments 5 | with audio podcast


Google might launch Drive for cloud storage soon

(PhysOrg.com) -- Google's next big move, according to the Wall Street Journal, is a cloud storage service called Drive. Hardly first to the plate, Google is simply catching up to introducing its cloud reposi ...

Walney offshore wind farm is world's biggest (for now)

(PhysOrg.com) -- The Walney wind farm on the Irish Sea--characterized by high tides, waves and windy weather--officially opened this week. The farm is treated in the press as a very big deal as the Walney ...

Latin America mining boom clashes with conservation

Latin America is experiencing a mining boom as prices rise fuelled by a hike in global demand, but the region is also being hit by a wave of violent protests, strikes and rallies by environmentalists.

Love a click away in Indonesia's Twitter Republic

He was a geeky kid from Yogyakarta, she a glamorous city girl in Jakarta. In a country with one of the world's most vibrant social networking scenes they fell in love on Twitter.

Europeans protest controversial Internet pact

Tens of thousands of people marched in protests in more than a dozen European cities Saturday against a controversial anti-online piracy pact that critics say could curtail Internet freedom.

Navy to begin tests on electromagnetic railgun prototype launcher

The Office of Naval Research (ONR)'s Electromagnetic (EM) Railgun program will take an important step forward in the coming weeks when the first industry railgun prototype launcher is tested at a facility ...