Long-term antipsychotic use and brain changes in schizophrenia - a systematic review and meta-analysis

Increased cell-free DNA is associated with oxidative damage in patients with schizophrenia

Cell-free DNA (cfDNA) has been found to be elevated in patients with schizophrenia (SZ), potentially derived from activated apoptosis, but the underlying mechanisms remain unknown. Moreover, whether the concentrations of cfDNA are altered with disease stage has not been investigated, which limits its clinical application as an auxiliary diagnostic marker for SZ. Using an improved fluorescence correlation spectroscopy (FCS) method that does not require DNA extraction, we measured the molar concentrations of cfDNA in plasma samples of 191 patients with SZ, 78 patients with mood disorders (MD) and 65 healthy controls (HC). We also analyzed the cfDNA composition from either the nucleus or mitochondria, oxidation markers and biochemical indexes to explore the potential mechanistic associations of the increased cfDNA levels. We found that in SZ patients, the cfDNA levels were significantly increased (P = 0.003) regardless of the different disease stages or antipsychotic medication use. Furthermore, qPCR revealed that cell-free nuclear DNA (cf-nDNA) (P = 0.041) but not cell-free mitochondrial DNA (cf-mtDNA) was elevated in SZ patients. Moreover, decreased SOD activity in SZ patients (P = 0.005) was negatively correlated with cfDNA levels (P = 0.047), and fasting blood glucose was positively correlated with cfDNA levels in SZ patients (P = 0.013). Our study provides evidence to support that the elevated cfDNA may be a convenient, effective and stable trait indicator of SZ. Further analysis showed that it mainly came from nucleus, suggesting increased apoptosis, and potentially related to oxidative stress and high blood glucose levels in patients.

The contribution of first-episode illness characteristics and cumulative antipsychotic usage to progressive structural brain changes over a long-term follow-up in schizophrenia

Exposure to antipsychotics as well as certain first-episode illness characteristics have been associated with greater gray matter (GM) deficits in the early phase of schizophrenia. Whether the first-episode illness characteristics affect the long-term progression of the structural brain changes remain unexplored. We therefore assessed the role of first-episode illness characteristics and life-time antipsychotic use in relation to long-term structural brain GM changes in schizophrenia. Individuals with schizophrenia (SZ, n = 29) and non-psychotic controls (n = 61) from the Northern Finland Birth Cohort 1966 underwent structural MRI at the ages of 34 (baseline) and 43 (follow-up) years. At follow-up, the average duration of illness was 19.8 years. Voxel-based morphometry was used to assess the effects of predictors on longitudinal GM changes in schizophrenia-relevant brain areas. Younger age of onset (AoO), higher cumulative antipsychotic dose and severity of symptoms were associated with greater GM deficits in the SZ group at follow-up. None of the first-episode illness characteristics were associated with longitudinal GM changes during 9-year follow-up period. We conclude that a younger AoO and high life-time antipsychotic use may contribute to progression of structural brain changes in schizophrenia. Apart from AoO, other first-episode illness characteristics may not contribute to longitudinal GM changes in midlife.

The effect of anticholinergic burden of psychiatric medications on major outcome domains of psychotic disorders: A 21-year prospective cohort study

BACKGROUND

Most medications used to treat psychotic disorders possess anticholinergic properties. This may result in a considerable anticholinergic burden (ACB), which may have deleterious effects on long-term outcomes. The extent to which cumulative ACB over years of treatment with psychotropic medications impacts different outcome domains remains unknown.

METHODS

This was a naturalistic study of 243 subjects with first-episode psychosis aimed at examining the cumulative effect of ACB of psychotropic medications administered over the illness course (ACB-years exposure) on several outcome domains assessed after a mean 21-year follow-up. Associations between ACB and the outcomes were modelled accounting for relevant confounding factors by using hierarchical linear regression analysis.

RESULTS

Over the study period, 81.9 % of the participants were dispensed at least one drug with strong anticholinergic effects for at least 1 year; at the follow-up visit, 60.5 % of the participants continued to take medications with strong ACB. ACB-years exposure was uniquely related to severity of negative symptoms (β = 0.144, p = 0.004), poor psychosocial functioning (β = 0.186, p < 0.001) and poor cognitive performance (β = -0.273, p < 0.001). This association pattern was independent of a schizophrenia diagnosis. Most of the associations between ACB at the follow-up visit and the outcomes were accounted for ACB-years exposure.

CONCLUSION

Lifetime ACB of psychotropic medications has deleterious effects on the outcome of psychotic disorders. Clinicians should avoid prescribing medications with strong ACB, since there are numerous alternatives within each psychotropic drug group for prescribing medications with low ACB.

Targeted Treatment of Schizophrenia Symptoms as They Manifest, or Continuous Treatment to Reduce the Risk of Psychosis Recurrence

Current pharmacological treatment of schizophrenia employs drugs that interfere with dopamine neurotransmission, aiming to suppress acute exacerbation of psychosis and maintenance treatment to reduce the risk of psychosis recurrence. According to this treatment scheme, available psychotropic drugs intended to treat negative symptoms, cognitive impairment, or anxiety are administered as add-ons to treatment with antipsychotics. However, an alternative treatment scheme proposes a targeted or intermittent treatment approach, by which antipsychotic drugs are administered upon psychosis exacerbation and discontinued upon remission or stabilization, while negative symptoms, cognitive impairment, or anxiety are treated with specific psychotropics as monotherapy. Along these lines, antipsychotics are renewed only in the event of recurrence of psychotic symptoms. This 50-year-old debate between targeted and continuous treatment schemes arises from disagreements about interpreting scientific evidence and discordant views regarding benefit/risk assessment. Among the debate's questions are: (1) what is the percentage of individuals who can maintain stability without antipsychotic maintenance treatment, and what is the percentage of those who exacerbate despite antipsychotic treatment? (2) how to interpret results of placebo-controlled 9- to 18-month-long maintenance trials in a life-long chronic disorder, and how to interpret results of the targeted trials, some of which are open label or not randomized; (3) how to weigh the decreased risk for psychotic recurrence vs the almost certainty of adverse effects on patient's quality of life. Patients' profiles, preferences, and circumstances of the care provision should be considered as the targeted vs continuous treatment options are considered.

Antipsychotic treatment effects and structural MRI brain changes in schizophrenia

BACKGROUND

Progressive brain structural MRI changes are described in schizophrenia and have been ascribed to both illness progression and antipsychotic treatment. We investigated treatment effects, in terms of total cumulative antipsychotic dose, efficacy and tolerability, on brain structural changes over the first 24 months of treatment in schizophrenia.

METHODS

A prospective, 24-month, single-site cohort study in 99 minimally treated patients with first-episode schizophrenia, schizophreniform and schizoaffective disorder, and 98 matched healthy controls. We treated the patients according to a fixed protocol with flupenthixol decanoate, a long-acting injectable antipsychotic. We assessed psychopathology, cognition, extrapyramidal symptoms and BMI, and acquired MRI scans at months 0, 12 and 24. We selected global cortical thickness, white matter volume and basal ganglia volume as the regions of interest.

RESULTS

The only significant group × time interaction was for basal ganglia volumes. However, patients, but not controls, displayed cortical thickness reductions and increases in white matter and basal ganglia volumes. Cortical thickness reductions were unrelated to treatment. White matter volume increases were associated with lower cumulative antipsychotic dose, greater improvements in psychopathology and cognition, and more extrapyramidal symptoms. Basal ganglia volume increases were associated with greater improvements in psychopathology, greater increases in BMI and more extrapyramidal symptoms.

CONCLUSIONS

We provide evidence for plasticity in white matter and basal ganglia associated with antipsychotic treatment in schizophrenia, most likely linked to the dopamine blocking actions of these agents. Cortical changes may be more closely related to the neurodevelopmental, non-dopaminergic aspects of the illness.

Dopamine supersensitivity psychosis and delay of clozapine treatment in patients with treatment-resistant schizophrenia

Both the underutilization of clozapine and treatment resistance of patients to clozapine are serious problems worldwide. Identifying clinical markers predicting response to clozapine would help clinicians more effectively utilize clozapine treatment. The present study retrospectively assessed dopamine supersensitivity psychosis (DSP) in addition to other measures such as age at disease onset and delay of clozapine introduction for a total of 47 treatment-resistant schizophrenia (TRS) patients. The response to clozapine was judged with CGI-C at 1 and 2 years from clozapine introduction. Results revealed that the DSP group tended to have a longer delay between designation of TRS and introduction of clozapine and continued to have slightly more severe psychopathology after treatment with clozapine, showing only slight improvement. The logistic regression analysis showed that the age at disease onset was the only significant indicator, predicting responsiveness to clozapine: patients with an onset age <20 years had a significantly better response to clozapine than patients with an onset age ≥20 years. The present study suggests that DSP might be related to a longer delay in clozapine introduction and the persistence of refractory symptoms despite clozapine treatment, whereas early age of disease onset might be related to a better response to clozapine.

Brain plasticity, language anomalies, genetic risk and the patient with schizophrenia: Trajectory of change over a lifetime. A commentary

Research on schizophrenia has been pursued for over a century. While the ability to view the brain and also the entire human genome advanced dramatically during this time and particularly in recent years, it is still unclear whether these advances helped to understand the nature of schizophrenia. What appears, however, to be the case is that early detection and treatment of people who are at high risk for developing schizophrenia due to various clinical signs, lead to better outcomes and recovery in many cases. Medications have also dramatically improved and have not been associated with the side-effects of earlier treatments, although they still are not without new sets of adverse effects. Over the years it was shown that structural brain abnormalities were present in the brains of people with chronic schizophrenia and that these observations were present early in the onset of illness. It was then shown these were not static and changed over the years of illness. At the same time it was shown that the brain centers for perceiving and speaking language appeared particularly abnormal in patients with schizophrenia and that these abnormalities could underlie the misperceptions and experiences of auditory hallucinations so characteristic of this illness. In a separate set of investigations that began with family, then twin and adoption studies, it was shown that schizophrenia is inherited, but in a complex manner. At present many genetic studies now find that genes, whose variants can lead to a high risk for schizophrenia, are ones specifically involving brain development and functioning. At present, although still speculative, it can be concluded that the progressive changes in brain structure, particularly related to language processing, take place in genetically vulnerable people and put them ultimately at high risk for developing schizophrenia in a trajectory for a lifelong illness. It is hoped that in the future these brain changes can be prevented by intervening early on the processes of brain growth and plasticity, thus arresting the illness before it begins.

Predicting aging trajectories of decline in brain volume, cortical thickness and fractional anisotropy in schizophrenia

Brain-age prediction is a novel approach to assessing deviated brain aging trajectories in different diseases. However, most studies have used an average brain age gap (BAG) of individuals with schizophrenia of different illness durations for comparison with healthy participants. Therefore, this study investigated whether declined brain structures as reflected by BAGs may be present in schizophrenia in terms of brain volume, cortical thickness, and fractional anisotropy across different illness durations. We used brain volume, cortical thickness, and fractional anisotropy as features to train three models from the training dataset. Three models were applied to predict brain ages in the hold-out test and schizophrenia datasets and calculate BAGs. We divided the schizophrenia dataset into multiple groups based on the illness duration using a sliding time window approach for ANCOVA analysis. The brain volume and cortical thickness models revealed that, in comparison with healthy controls, individuals with schizophrenia had larger BAGs across different illness durations, whereas the BAG in terms of fractional anisotropy did not differ from that of healthy controls after disease onset. Moreover, the BAG at the initial stage of schizophrenia was the largest in the cortical thickness model. In contrast, the BAG from approximately two decades after disease onset was the largest in the brain volume model. Our findings suggest that schizophrenia differentially affects the decline of different brain structures during the disease course. Moreover, different trends of decline in thickness and volume-based measures suggest a differential decline in dimensions of brain structure throughout the course of schizophrenia.

The impact of smoking status on cognition and brain morphology in schizophrenia spectrum disorders

BACKGROUND

Cigarette smoking is associated with worse cognition and decreased cortical volume and thickness in healthy cohorts. Chronic cigarette smoking is prevalent in schizophrenia spectrum disorders (SSD), but the effects of smoking status on the brain and cognition in SSD are not clear. This study aimed to understand whether cognitive performance and brain morphology differed between smoking and non-smoking individuals with SSD compared to healthy controls.

METHODS

Data were obtained from the Australian Schizophrenia Research Bank. Cognitive functioning was measured in 299 controls and 455 SSD patients. Cortical volume, thickness and surface area data were analysed from T1-weighted structural scans obtained in a subset of the sample (n = 82 controls, n = 201 SSD). Associations between smoking status (cigarette smoker/non-smoker), cognition and brain morphology were tested using analyses of covariance, including diagnosis as a moderator.

RESULTS

No smoking by diagnosis interactions were evident, and no significant differences were revealed between smokers and non-smokers across any of the variables measured, with the exception of a significantly thinner left posterior cingulate in smokers compared to non-smokers. Several main effects of smoking in the cognitive, volume and thickness analyses were initially significant but did not survive false discovery rate (FDR) correction.

CONCLUSIONS

Despite the general absence of significant FDR-corrected findings, trend-level effects suggest the possibility that subtle smoking-related effects exist but were not uncovered due to low statistical power. An investigation of this topic is encouraged to confirm and expand on our findings.

Altered Surface Area Covariance in the Mentalizing Network in Schizophrenia: Insight Into Theory of Mind Processing

BACKGROUND

Theory of mind (ToM), the cognitive capacity to attribute mental states to self and others, is robustly affected in schizophrenia. The neural substrates of ToM impairment have been largely studied with functional imaging, but little is known about structural abnormalities. We compared structural covariance (between-subjects correlations of brain regional measures) of magnetic resonance imaging-based cortical surface area between patients with schizophrenia and healthy control subjects and between schizophrenia subgroups based on the patients' ToM ability to examine ToM-specific effects on structural covariance in schizophrenia.

METHODS

T1-weighted structural images were acquired on a 3T magnetic resonance imaging scanner, and ToM was assessed with the Hinting Task for 104 patients with schizophrenia and 69 healthy control subjects. The sum of surface area was computed for 12 regions of interest selected and compared between groups to examine structural covariance within the often reported mentalizing network: rostral and caudal middle frontal gyrus, inferior parietal lobule, precuneus, and middle and superior temporal gyrus. High and low ToM groups were defined using a median split on the Hinting Task.

RESULTS

Cortical surface contraction was observed in the schizophrenia group, predominantly in temporoparietal regions. Patients with schizophrenia also exhibited significantly stronger covariance between the right rostral middle frontal gyrus and the right superior temporal gyrus than control subjects (r = 4.015; p < .001). Direct comparisons between high and low ToM subgroups revealed stronger contralateral frontotemporal covariances in the low ToM group.

CONCLUSIONS

Our results provide evidence for structural changes underlying ToM impairments in schizophrenia that need to be confirmed to develop new therapeutic perspectives.

Elevated brain-derived cell-free DNA among patients with first psychotic episode - a proof-of-concept study

Schizophrenia is a common, severe, and debilitating psychiatric disorder. Despite extensive research there is as yet no biological marker that can aid in its diagnosis and course prediction. This precludes early detection and intervention. Imaging studies suggest brain volume loss around the onset and over the first few years of schizophrenia, and apoptosis has been proposed as the underlying mechanism. Cell-free DNA (cfDNA) fragments are released into the bloodstream following cell death. Tissue-specific methylation patterns allow the identification of the tissue origins of cfDNA. We developed a cocktail of brain-specific DNA methylation markers, and used it to assess the presence of brain-derived cfDNA in the plasma of patients with a first psychotic episode. We detected significantly elevated neuron- (p=0.0013), astrocyte- (p=0.0016), oligodendrocyte- (p=0.0129), and whole brain-derived (p=0.0012) cfDNA in the plasma of patients during their first psychotic episode (n=29), compared with healthy controls (n=31). Increased cfDNA levels were not correlated with psychotropic medications use. Area under the curve (AUC) was 0.77, with 65% sensitivity at 90% specificity in patients with a psychotic episode. Potential interpretations of these findings include increased brain cell death, disruption of the blood-brain barrier, or a defect in clearance of material from dying brain cells. Brain-specific cfDNA methylation markers can potentially assist early detection and monitoring of schizophrenia and thus allow early intervention and adequate therapy.

The effect of first- and second-generation antipsychotics on brain morphology in schizophrenia: A systematic review of longitudinal magnetic resonance studies with a randomized allocation to treatment arms

Schizophrenia manifests as loss of brain volume in specific areas in a progressive nature and an important question concerns whether long-term treatment with medications contributes to this. The aim of the current PRISMA systematic review was to search for prospective studies involving randomization to treatment. PROSPERO ID: CRD42020197874. The MEDLINE/PUBMED was searched and it returned 2638 articles; 3 were fulfilling the inclusion criteria. A fourth was published later; they included 359 subjects, of whom 86 were healthy controls, while the rest were first-episode patients, with 91 under olanzapine, 93 under haloperidol, 48 under risperidone, 5 under paliperidone, 6 under ziprasidone, and 30 under placebo. Probably one-third of patients were suffering from a psychotic disorder other than schizophrenia. The consideration of their results suggested that there is no significant difference between these medications concerning their effects on brain structure and also in comparison to healthy subjects. There does not seem to be any strong support to the opinion that medications that treat psychosis cause loss of brain volume in patients with schizophrenia. On the contrary, the data might imply the possible presence of a protective effect for D2, 5-HT2, and NE alpha-2 antagonists (previously called SGAs). However, the literature is limited and focused research in large study samples is essential to clarify the issue, since important numerical differences do exist. The possibility of the results and their heterogeneity to be artifacts secondary to a modification of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) signal by antipsychotics should not be easily rejected until relevant data are available.

Present and future antipsychotic drugs: a systematic review of the putative mechanisms of action for efficacy and a critical appraisal under a translational perspective

Antipsychotics represent the mainstay of schizophrenia pharmacological therapy, and their role has been expanded in the last years to mood disorders treatment. Although introduced in 1952, many years of research were required before an accurate picture of how antipsychotics work began to emerge. Despite the well-recognized characterization of antipsychotics in typical and atypical based on their liability to induce motor adverse events, their main action at dopamine D2R to elicit the "anti-psychotic" effect, as well as the multimodal action at other classes of receptors, their effects on intracellular mechanisms starting with receptor occupancy is still not completely understood. Significant lines of evidence converge on the impact of these compounds on multiple molecular signaling pathways implicated in the regulation of early genes and growth factors, dendritic spine shape, brain inflammation, and immune response, tuning overall the function and architecture of the synapse. Here we present, based on PRISMA approach, a comprehensive and systematic review of the above mechanisms under a translational perspective to disentangle those intracellular actions and signaling that may underline clinically relevant effects and represent potential targets for further innovative strategies in antipsychotic therapy.

The effects of cumulative antipsychotic dose on brain structures in patients with schizophrenia: Observational study of multiple CT scans over a long-term clinical course

Multiple lines of evidence indicate that antipsychotic agents could affect brain structures of schizophrenia patients. However, the effect of antipsychotic dosage or type on brain structure is uncertain. The present study retrospectively analyzed brain computed tomography (CT) images from a psychiatric hospital to examine the relationship between cumulative dose of antipsychotics and brain volume reduction in schizophrenia patients. A total of 43 patients with repeated relapse episode of psychosis were included and CT scans that were performed an average of 3.2 times per patient during nearly 13 years of follow-up were analyzed. The results revealed significant positive relationships of expansion of cerebrospinal fluid space with cumulative dosage of all antipsychotics and that of typical antipsychotics. Patients treated with antipsychotics including typical antipsychotics exhibited a greater volume reduction compared to patients treated with only atypical antipsychotics. The present study was one of the longest longitudinal studies examining the effects of antipsychotics on brain volume in schizophrenia patients. These results suggest a relation between cumulative lifetime antipsychotic dosage and progressive brain volume reduction in patients with schizophrenia. However, the effects of specific agent on brain structure are still uncertain, and more detailed analysis is needed.

Reduced GABAergic neuropil and interneuron profiles in schizophrenia: Complementary analysis of disease course-related differences

BACKGROUND

GABAergic interneuron dysfunction has been implicated in the pathophysiology of schizophrenia. Expression of glutamic acid decarboxylase (GAD), a key enzyme in GABA synthesis, may also be altered. Here, we have simultaneously evaluated GAD-immunoreactive (GAD-ir) neuropil and cell profiles in schizophrenia-relevant brain regions, and analysed disease-course related differences.

METHODS

GAD65/67 immunoreactivity was quantified in specific brain regions for profiles of fibres and cell bodies of interneurons by automated digital image analysis in post-mortem brains of 16 schizophrenia patients from paranoid (n = 10) and residual (n = 6) diagnostic subgroups and 16 matched controls. Regions of interest were superior temporal gyrus (STG) layers III and V, mediodorsal (MD) and laterodorsal (LD) thalamus, and hippocampal CA1 and dentate gyrus (DG) regions.

RESULTS

A reduction in GAD-ir neuropil profiles (p < 0.001), particularly in STG layer V (p = 0.012) and MD (p = 0.001), paralleled decreased GAD-ir cell profiles (p = 0.029) in schizophrenia patients compared to controls. Paranoid schizophrenia patients had lower GAD-ir neuron cell profiles in STG layers III (p = 0.007) and V (p = 0.001), MD (p = 0.002), CA1 (p = 0.001) and DG (p = 0.043) than residual patients. There was no difference in GAD-ir neuropil profiles between paranoid and residual subgroups (p = 0.369).

CONCLUSIONS

These results support the hypothesis of GABAergic dysfunction in schizophrenia. They show a more prominent reduction of GAD-ir interneurons in paranoid versus residual patients, suggestive of more pronounced GABAergic dysfunction in the former. Fully automated analyses of histological sections represent a step towards user-independent assessment of brain structure.

Atypical attentional filtering of visual information in youth with chromosome 22q11.2 deletion syndrome as indexed by event-related potentials

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Attentional control measured in 22q youth and typically developing control group.

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Differences in attentional control indexed by N2pc and PD event-related potentials.

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22q youth exhibited sustained focus on distractor cues and reduced suppression.

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No relationships between attentional control and psychosis-proneness in 22q youth.

Background

Youth with chromosome 22q11.2 deletion syndrome (22q) face one of the highest genetic risk factors for the development of schizophrenia. Previous research suggests impairments in attentional control and potential interactions with elevated anxiety and reduced adaptive functioning may increase the risk for developing psychosis in this population. Here, we examined how variations in attentional control relate to the presence or severity of psychosis-proneness symptoms in these individuals.

Methods

To achieve this, we measured attentional control in youth (12–18 years) with 22q (N = 35) compared to a typically developing group (N = 45), using a flanker task (the Distractor Target task) while measuring neural activity with event-related potentials.

Results

Similar to previous findings observed in people with schizophrenia, greater attentional capture by, and reduced suppression of, non-target flanker stimuli characterized participants with 22q and was indexed by the N2pc (N2-posterior-contralateral) and P_D (distractor positivity) components. Although we observed no relationships between these components and measures of psychosis-proneness in youth with 22q, these individuals endorsed a relatively low incidence of positive symptoms overall.

Conclusions

Our results provide neural evidence of an attentional control impairment in youth with 22q that suggests these individuals experience sustained attentional focus on irrelevant information and reduced suppression of distracting stimuli in their environment. Impairments in attentional control might be a valid biomarker of the potential to develop attenuated positive symptoms or frank psychosis in high-risk individuals long before the age at which such symptoms typically arise. The evaluation of such a hypothesis, and the preventive potential for the putative biomarker, should be the focus of future studies.

Evaluation of CSF flow dynamics in patients with schizophrenia using phase-contrast cine MRI

Patients with schizophrenia show progressive clinical deterioration. Brain abnormalities have been suggested in these patients, including enlargement of the lateral ventricles, increased cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) volume and reductions in the frontal and temporal lobes. CSF flow pathology is a central factor in the development of many neurological disorders, but much less is known about the role of CSF flow dynamics in schizophrenia. In this study, parameters of CSF flow dynamics at the aqueduct level of 50 schizophrenic patients were compared to those of 50 controls using phase-contrast cine magnetic resonance imaging. Patients had lower peak velocity, lower net forward volume, and lower average flow over the range studied than controls. The average velocity was significantly lower in patients exhibiting violent behavior compared to non-violent patients. The aqueduct tendedto be larger in schizophrenic patients with earlier age of onset of the disorder. Furthermore, as the number of hospitalizations increased, the average velocity and flow over the range studied decreased commensurately. This study demonstrated that CSF flow dynamics are altered in patients with schizophrenia. The results indicated that additional studies of CSF flow dynamics in schizophrenia are needed, along with volumetric examinations of the brain, to elucidate the pathophysiology of the disease.

Global hypomyelination of the brain white and gray matter in schizophrenia: quantitative imaging using macromolecular proton fraction

Myelin deficiency is commonly recognized as an important pathological feature of brain tissues in schizophrenia (SZ). In this pilot study, global myelin content abnormalities in white matter (WM) and gray matter (GM) of SZ patients were non-invasively investigated using a novel clinically-targeted quantitative myelin imaging technique, fast macromolecular proton fraction (MPF) mapping. MPF maps were obtained from 23 healthy subjects and 31 SZ patients using a clinical 1.5T magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scanner. Mean MPF in WM and GM was compared between the healthy control subjects and SZ patients with positive and negative leading symptoms using the multivariate analysis of covariance. The SZ patients had significantly reduced MPF in GM (p < 0.001) and WM (p = 0.02) with the corresponding relative decrease of 5% and 3%, respectively. The effect sizes for the myelin content loss in SZ relative to the control group were 1.0 and 1.5 for WM and GM, respectively. The SZ patients with leading negative symptoms had significantly lower MPF in GM (p < 0.001) and WM (p = 0.003) as compared to the controls and showed a significant MPF decrease in WM (p = 0.03) relative to the patients with leading positive symptoms. MPF in WM significantly negatively correlated with the disease duration in SZ patients (Pearson's r = -0.51; p = 0.004). This study demonstrates that chronic SZ is characterized by global microscopic brain hypomyelination of both WM and GM, which is associated with the disease duration and negative symptoms. Myelin deficiency in SZ can be detected and quantified by the fast MPF mapping method.

The progression of disorder-specific brain pattern expression in schizophrenia over 9 years

Age plays a crucial role in the performance of schizophrenia vs. controls (SZ-HC) neuroimaging-based machine learning (ML) models as the accuracy of identifying first-episode psychosis from controls is poor compared to chronic patients. Resolving whether this finding reflects longitudinal progression in a disorder-specific brain pattern or a systematic but non-disorder-specific deviation from a normal brain aging (BA) trajectory in schizophrenia would help the clinical translation of diagnostic ML models. We trained two ML models on structural MRI data: an SZ-HC model based on 70 schizophrenia patients and 74 controls and a BA model (based on 561 healthy individuals, age range = 66 years). We then investigated the two models’ predictions in the naturalistic longitudinal Northern Finland Birth Cohort 1966 (NFBC1966) following 29 schizophrenia and 61 controls for nine years. The SZ-HC model’s schizophrenia-specificity was further assessed by utilizing independent validation (62 schizophrenia, 95 controls) and depression samples (203 depression, 203 controls). We found better performance at the NFBC1966 follow-up (sensitivity = 75.9%, specificity = 83.6%) compared to the baseline (sensitivity = 58.6%, specificity = 86.9%). This finding resulted from progression in disorder-specific pattern expression in schizophrenia and was not explained by concomitant acceleration of brain aging. The disorder-specific pattern’s progression reflected longitudinal changes in cognition, outcomes, and local brain changes, while BA captured treatment-related and global brain alterations. The SZ-HC model was also generalizable to independent schizophrenia validation samples but classified depression as control subjects. Our research underlines the importance of taking account of longitudinal progression in a disorder-specific pattern in schizophrenia when developing ML classifiers for different age groups.

Negative Prognostic Effect of Baseline Antipsychotic Exposure in Clinical High Risk for Psychosis (CHR-P): Is Pre-Test Risk Enrichment the Hidden Culprit?

INTRODUCTION

Sample enrichment is a key factor in contemporary early-detection strategies aimed at the identification of help-seekers at increased risk of imminent transition to psychosis. We undertook a meta-analytic investigation to ascertain the role of sample enrichment in the recently highlighted negative prognostic effect of baseline antipsychotic (AP) exposure in clinical high-risk (CHR-P) of psychosis individuals.

METHODS

Systematic review and meta-analysis of all published studies on CHR-P were identified according to a validated diagnostic procedure. The outcome was the proportion of transition to psychosis, which was calculated according to the Freeman-Tukey double arcsine transformation.

RESULTS

Thirty-three eligible studies were identified, including 16 samples with details on AP exposure at baseline and 17 samples with baseline AP exposure as exclusion criterion for enrollment. Those with baseline exposure to AP (n = 395) had higher transition rates (29.9%; 95% CI: 25.1%-34.8%) than those without baseline exposure to AP in the same study (n = 1289; 17.2%; 15.1%-19.4%) and those coming from samples that did not include people who were exposed to AP at baseline (n = 2073; 16.2%; 14.6%-17.8%; P < .05 in both the fixed-effects and the random-effects models). Heterogeneity within studies was substantial, with values above 75% in all comparisons.

CONCLUSIONS

Sample enrichment is not a plausible explanation for the higher risk of transition to psychosis of CHR-P individuals who were already exposed to AP at the enrollment in specialized early-detection programs. Baseline exposure to AP at CHR-P assessment is a major index of enhanced, imminent risk of psychosis.

Brain gray matter differences among forensic psychiatric patients with psychosis and incarcerated individuals without psychosis: A source-based morphometry study

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We employed source-based morphometry to examine grey matter differences in forensic psychiatric patients with psychosis versus incarcerated controls without psychosis.

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Compared to the psychotic group, the non-psychotic group demonstrated greater loading weights in the superior, transverse, and middle temporal gyrus and the anterior cingulate.

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Compared to the non-psychotic group, the psychotic group exhibited greater loading weights in the frontal pole, precuneus, basal ganglia, thalamus, parahippocampal gyrus, and visual cortex.

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Neuroimaging investigations of offenders with psychosis ought to control for the level of psychopathic traits present.

Background

While psychosis is a risk factor for violence, the majority of individuals who perpetrate aggression do not present psychotic symptoms. Pathological aggressive behavior is associated with brain gray matter differences, which, in turn, has shown a relationship with increased psychopathic traits. However, no study, to our knowledge, has ever investigated gray matter differences in forensic psychiatric patients with psychosis compared with incarcerated individuals without psychosis matched on levels of psychopathic traits. Here, we employed source-based morphometry (SBM) to investigate gray matter differences in these two populations.

Methods

We scanned 137 participants comprising two offender subgroups: 69, non-psychotic incarcerated offenders and 68, psychotic, forensic psychiatric patients. Groups showed no difference in age, race, ethnicity, handedness, and Hare Psychopathy Checklist-Revised scores. Source-based morphometry was utilized to identify spatially distinct sets of brain regions where gray matter volumes covaried between groups. SBM is a data-driven, multivariate technique that uses independent components analysis to categorize groups of voxels that display similar variance patterns (e.g., components) that are compared across groups.

Results

SBM identified four components that differed between groups. These findings indicated greater loading weights in the superior, transverse, and middle temporal gyrus and anterior cingulate in the non-psychotic versus psychotic group; greater loading weights in the basal ganglia in the psychotic versus non-psychotic group; greater loading weights in the frontal pole, precuneus, and visual cortex among psychotic versus non-psychotic offenders; and greater loading weights in the thalamus and parahippocampal gyrus in psychotic versus non-psychotic groups.

Conclusions

Two different offender groups that perpetrate violence and show comparable levels of psychopathic traits evidenced different gray matter volumes. We suggest that future studies of violent offenders with psychosis take psychopathic traits into account to refine neural phenotypes.

The implications of hypothalamic abnormalities for schizophrenia

Until a few years ago, the hypothalamus was believed to play only a marginal role in schizophrenia pathophysiology. However, recent findings show that this rather small brain region involved in many pathways found disrupted-in schizophrenia. Gross anatomic abnormalities (volume changes of the third ventricle, the hypothalamus, and its individual nuclei) as well as alterations at the cellular level (circumscribed loss of neurons) can be observed. Further, increased or decreased expression of hypothalamic peptides such as oxytocin, vasopressin, several factors involved in the regulation of appetite and satiety, endogenous opiates, products of schizophrenia susceptibility genes as well as of enzymes involved in neurotransmitter and neuropeptide metabolism have been reported in schizophrenia and/or animal models of the disease. Remarkably, although profound disturbances of the hypothalamus-pituitary-adrenal axis, hypothalamus-pituitary-thyroid axis, and the hypothalamus-pituitary-gonadal axis are typical signs of schizophrenia, there is currently no evidence for alterations in the expression of hypothalamic-releasing and inhibiting factors that control these hormonal axes. Finally, the implications of hypothalamus for disease-related disturbances of the sleep-wakefulness cycle and neuroimmune dysfunctions in schizophrenia are outlined.

Effects of Antipsychotic Drugs: Cross Talk Between the Nervous and Innate Immune System

Converging lines of evidence suggest that activation of microglia (innate immune cells in the central nervous system [CNS]) is present in a subset of patients with schizophrenia. The extent to which antipsychotic drug treatment contributes to or combats this effect remains unclear. To address this question, we reviewed the literature for evidence that antipsychotic exposure influences brain microglia as indexed by in vivo neuroimaging and post-mortem studies in patients with schizophrenia and experimental animal models. We found no clear evidence from clinical studies for an effect of antipsychotics on either translocator protein (TSPO) radioligand binding (an in vivo neuroimaging measure of putative gliosis) or markers of brain microglia in post-mortem studies. In experimental animals, where drug and illness effects may be differentiated, we also found no clear evidence for consistent effects of antipsychotic drugs on TSPO radioligand binding. By contrast, we found evidence that chronic antipsychotic exposure may influence central microglia density and morphology. However, these effects were dependent on the dose and duration of drug exposure and whether an immune stimulus was present or not. In the latter case, antipsychotics were generally reported to suppress expression of inflammatory cytokines and inducible inflammatory enzymes such as cyclooxygenase and microglia activation. No clear conclusions could be drawn with regard to any effect of antipsychotics on brain microglia from current clinical data. There is evidence to suggest that antipsychotic drugs influence brain microglia in experimental animals, including possible anti-inflammatory actions. However, we lack detailed information on how these drugs influence brain microglia function at the molecular level. The clinical relevance of the animal data with regard to beneficial treatment effects and detrimental side effects of antipsychotic drugs also remains unknown, and further studies are warranted.

Support vector machine-based classification of schizophrenia patients and healthy controls using structural magnetic resonance imaging from two independent sites

Structural brain alterations have been repeatedly reported in schizophrenia; however, the pathophysiology of its alterations remains unclear. Multivariate pattern recognition analysis such as support vector machines can classify patients and healthy controls by detecting subtle and spatially distributed patterns of structural alterations. We aimed to use a support vector machine to distinguish patients with schizophrenia from control participants on the basis of structural magnetic resonance imaging data and delineate the patterns of structural alterations that significantly contributed to the classification performance. We used independent datasets from different sites with different magnetic resonance imaging scanners, protocols and clinical characteristics of the patient group to achieve a more accurate estimate of the classification performance of support vector machines. We developed a support vector machine classifier using the dataset from one site (101 participants) and evaluated the performance of the trained support vector machine using a dataset from the other site (97 participants) and vice versa. We assessed the performance of the trained support vector machines in each support vector machine classifier. Both support vector machine classifiers attained a classification accuracy of >70% with two independent datasets indicating a consistently high performance of support vector machines even when used to classify data from different sites, scanners and different acquisition protocols. The regions contributing to the classification accuracy included the bilateral medial frontal cortex, superior temporal cortex, insula, occipital cortex, cerebellum, and thalamus, which have been reported to be related to the pathogenesis of schizophrenia. These results indicated that the support vector machine could detect subtle structural brain alterations and might aid our understanding of the pathophysiology of these changes in schizophrenia, which could be one of the diagnostic findings of schizophrenia.

Rethinking the risks and benefits of long-term maintenance in schizophrenia

This review addresses the risks and benefits of long-term maintenance antipsychotic treatment for patients that extends beyond two years. It focuses on framing discussions with patients who are recovering from a first episode. For these patients the evidence strongly supports the benefits over the risk for the first two years. However, both the clinical side effects of antipsychotics and the possible long-term effects of dopamine blocking drugs on the brain require a more nuanced discussion beyond this initial period. In most cases, the decision will be to continue antipsychotics but to consider strategies for mitigating the risks of drugs. This review provides information about the relative risks of dose reduction and intermittent treatment.

Neurocognitive functioning in patients with first-episode schizophrenia: results of a prospective 15-year follow-up study

To evaluate the course of neuropsychological impairment, patients with first-episode schizophrenia and healthy controls were assessed with a comprehensive test battery at the time of index treatment and after a 5- and 15-year follow-up period. Summary scores for verbal intelligence (VBI), spatial organization, verbal fluency, verbal learning, semantic memory, visual memory, delay/retention rate, short-term memory, visual-motor processing and attention (VSM) and abstraction/flexibility were constructed. Our results show that neurocognitive functioning is impaired already at the onset of schizophrenia and remains stable over the 15-year follow-up period with an improvement in VBI. With regard to the presence of a deficit syndrome, it became apparent that the group with a deficit syndrome showed a deterioration of neurocognitive functions during the follow-up period, most pronounced in VSM. On the other hand, the group without a deficit syndrome showed an improvement in neurocognitive functions at the 15-year follow-up, which exceeded the learning effects of healthy control subjects. Neurocognitive performance at index assessment strongly predicted the performance at the 15-year follow-up. Most likely due to the small sample size, there were only weak associations between treatment with different types of neuroleptics and neurocognitive performance.

Body mass index, residual psychotic symptoms, and inflammation associated with brain volume reduction in older patients with schizophrenia

Obesity, aging, and pathophysiology of schizophrenia (SCZ) may collectively contribute to the gray matter loss in brain regions of SCZ. We attempted to examine the association between volumes of specific brain regions, body mass index (BMI), inflammatory markers, and clinical features in older SCZ patients.

METHOD

Clinically stable outpatients with schizophrenia (DSM-IV) aged ≥50 years were recruited to undergo whole-brain magnetic resonance imaging. We measured patients' plasma levels of soluble tumor necrosis factor receptor-1, soluble interleukin (IL)-2 receptor (sIL-2R), IL-1β, and IL-1 receptor antagonist (IL-1Ra). Clinical data were obtained from medical records and interviewing patients along with their reliable others.

RESULTS

There were 32 patients with mean age 58.8 years in this study. Multivariate regression analysis found only higher BMI significantly associated with lower volume of total gray matter, bilateral orbitofrontal and prefrontal cortexes, and the right hippocampal and frontal cortexes. Increased intensity of residual symptoms (higher Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale scores) was related to lower volumes of frontal lobe, prefrontal cortex, insula, hippocampus, left hemisphere amygdala, and total white matter. The lower volume of left anterior cingulum was associated with older age and higher sIL-2R plasma level; and higher IL-1Ra level was associated with greater right anterior cingulate volume. Older age at illness onset was significantly associated with the smaller right insula volume.

CONCLUSIONS

Higher BMI, more residual symptoms, and inflammatory activity in IL-2 and IL-1 systems may play a role in gray matter loss in various brain regions of schizophrenia across the life span.

Striatal Volume Increase After Six Weeks of Selective Dopamine D2/3 Receptor Blockade in First-Episode, Antipsychotic-Naïve Schizophrenia Patients

Patients with chronic schizophrenia often display enlarged striatal volumes, and antipsychotic drugs may contribute via the dopamine D_2/3 receptor (D_2/3R) blockade. Separating the effects of disease from medication is challenging due to the lack of a proper placebo-group. To address this, we conducted a longitudinal study of antipsychotic-naïve, first-episode schizophrenia patients to test the hypothesis that selective blockade of D_2/3R would induce a dose-dependent striatal volume increase. Twenty-one patients underwent structural magnetic resonance imaging (sMRI), single-photon emission computed tomography (SPECT), and symptom severity ratings before and after six weeks of amisulpride treatment. Twenty-three matched healthy controls underwent sMRI and baseline SPECT. Data were analyzed using repeated measures and multiple regression analyses. Correlations between symptom severity decrease, volume changes, dose and receptor occupancy were explored. Striatal volumes did not differ between patients and controls at baseline or follow-up, but a significant group-by-time interaction was found (p = 0.01). This interaction was explained by a significant striatal volume increase of 2.1% in patients (Cohens d = 0.45). Striatal increase was predicted by amisulpride dose, but not by either D_2/3R occupancy or baseline symptom severity. A significant reduction in symptom severity was observed at a mean dose of 233.3 (SD = 109.9) mg, corresponding to D_2/3R occupancy of 44.65%. Reduction in positive symptoms correlated significantly with striatal volume increase, driven by reductions in hallucinations. Our data demonstrate a clear link between antipsychotic treatment and striatal volume increase in antipsychotic-naïve schizophrenia patients. Moreover, the treatment-induced striatal volume increase appears clinically relevant by correlating to reductions in core symptoms of schizophrenia.

Characteristics of gray matter alterations in never-treated and treated chronic schizophrenia patients

Though gray matter deficits have been consistently revealed in chronic treated schizophrenia, it is still not clear whether there are different brain alterations between chronic never treated and treated patients. To explore the different patterns of gray matter alterations among chronic never treated patients and those treated with monotherapy, we recruited 35 never-treated chronic schizophrenia patients with illness durations ranging from 5 to 48 years, 20 illness duration-matched risperidone monotherapy and 20 clozapine monotherapy patients, and 55 healthy controls. GM (surface area, cortical thickness, and cortical volume) measures were extracted and compared using ANCOVA across the four groups followed by post hoc tests. Relative to controls, both treated and never-treated chronic schizophrenia patients showed reduced GM mainly involving the bilateral medial and rostral middle frontal, left banks superior temporal sulcus, left fusiform, and left pericalcarine cortex and increased in the left cuneus. Compared with the untreated patient group, the two treated groups showed reductions mainly in the bilateral prefrontal, temporal, and left inferior parietal lobules. The clozapine monotherapy patients demonstrated more severe decreases in the bilateral prefrontal cortex and left cuneus and less severe decreases in the left ventral temporal lobe than risperidone monotherapy patients. These findings provide new insights into the long-term effects of antipsychotic treatment on gray matter alterations in schizophrenia patients. Furthermore, the characteristic findings of reductions in the inferior parietal lobule might be specific for long-term antipsychotic treatment, which could be a possible target for medication development in the future.

Neurological soft signs (NSS) and brain morphology in patients with chronic schizophrenia and healthy controls

Subtle abnormalities in sensory integration, motor coordination and sequencing of complex motor acts or neurological soft signs (NSS) are characteristic phenomena in patients with schizophrenia at any stage of the illness. Previous MRI studies in schizophrenia found NSS to be associated with cortical, thalamic and cerebellar changes. Since these studies mainly focused on first-episode or recent onset schizophrenia, the cerebral correlates of NSS in chronic schizophrenia remained rather unclear. 49 middle-aged patients with chronic schizophrenia with a mean duration of illness of 20.3 ± 14.0 years and 29 healthy subjects matched for age and sex were included. NSS were examined on the Heidelberg Scale and correlated to grey matter (GM) by using whole brain high resolution magnetic resonance imaging (3 Tesla) with SPM12/CAT12 analyses. As expected, NSS in patients were significantly (p≤0.001) elevated in contrast to healthy controls, a finding, which not only applied to NSS total score, but also to the respective subscales "motor coordination", "sensory integration", "complex motor tasks", "right/left and spatial orientation" and "hard signs". Within the patient group NSS total scores were significantly correlated to reduced GM in right lingual gyrus, left parahippocampal gyrus, left superior temporal gyrus, left thalamus (medial dorsal nucleus) and left posterior lobe of the cerebellum (declive). Respective negative associations could also be revealed for the subscales "motor coordination", "complex motor tasks" and "right/left and spatial orientation". These findings remained significant after FWE-correction for multiple comparisons and were confirmed when years of education, chlorpromazine-equivalents or variables indicating the severity of psychopathology were introduced as additional covariates. According to our results lingual, parahippocampal, superior temporal, inferior and middle frontal gyri, thalamus and cerebellum have to be considered as important sites of NSS in chronic schizophrenia. That these findings only applied for patients but not healthy controls may indicate a different pathogenesis of NSS.

Total gray matter volume is reduced in individuals with bipolar disorder currently treated with atypical antipsychotics

BACKGROUND/AIMS

Recent evidence indicates that the intake of atypical antipsychotics (AAP) is associated with gray matter abnormalities in patients with psychiatric disorders. We explored if patients with bipolar disorder (BD) who are medicated with AAP exhibit total gray matter volume (TGV) reduction compared to BD individuals not medicated with AAP and healthy controls (HC).

METHODS

In a cross-sectional design, 124 individuals with BD and 86 HC underwent 3T-MRI of the brain and clinical assessment as part of our BIPFAT-study. The TGV was estimated using Freesurfer. We used univariate covariance analysis (ANCOVA) to test for normalized TGV differences and controlled for covariates.

RESULTS

ANCOVA results indicated that 75 BD individuals taking AAP had significantly reduced normalized TGV as compared to 49 BD not taking AAP (F = 9.995, p = .002., Eta = 0.084) and 86 HC (F = 7.577, p = .007, Eta = 0.046).

LIMITATIONS

Our cross-sectional results are not suited to draw conclusions about causality. We have no clear information on treatment time and baseline volumes before drug treatment in the studied subjects. We cannot exclude that patients received different psychopharmacologic medications prior to the study point. We did not included dosages into the calculation. Many BD individuals received combinations of psychopharmacotherapy across drug classes. We did not have records displaying quantitative alcohol consumption and drug abuse in our sample.

CONCLUSIONS

Our data provide further evidence for the impact of AAP on brain structure in BD. Longitudinal studies are needed to investigate the causal directions of the proposed relationships.

Neurophysiological effects of multiple mood episodes in bipolar disorder

OBJECTIVES

Bipolar disorder is marked by progressive symptomatic changes, which have been linked with episode-related structural findings-particularly in the prefrontal cortex. However, few studies have examined neurofunctional and neurochemical effects of disease burden. In this study, we compared first- and multi-episode bipolar individuals. We hypothesized that the latter would demonstrate evidence of neurophysiological differences consistent with a model of progressive functional degradation of these networks.

METHODS

First- and multi-episode manic bipolar subjects participated in functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) including a continuous performance task with emotional distractors, and in single-voxel (¹ H) magnetic resonance spectroscopy (MRS). A priori fMRI regions-of-interest (ROI) included structures comprising prefrontal-striatal-amygdala networks; (¹ H)MRS voxels were placed within bilateral ventrolateral prefrontal (VLPFC) and anterior cingulate cortex (ACC). Both ROI and voxel-based brain activation in response to emotional stimuli, and neurochemical concentrations derived from (¹ H)MRS were compared across bipolar groups.

RESULTS

Multi-episode bipolar subjects showed relatively lower regional activation across prefrontal-striatal-amygdala networks, including bilateral VLPFC, orbitofrontal cortex, ACC, putamen, caudate, and amygdala. Exploratory whole-brain, voxel-based analysis suggested additional areas of lower activation extending into Brodmann area 22, posterior parietal regions, and right thalamus. Glutamate and N-acetylaspartate (NAA) concentrations were also relatively lower in the ACC of multi-episode subjects.

CONCLUSIONS

Disease burden, exemplified by multiple affective episodes is associated with evidence of widespread decrements in affective network activity. Lower ACC NAA concentration is similarly consistent with a model of progressive functional deficits. These findings support the functional significance of previously observed progressive structural changes throughout these regions.

A preliminary study of cortical morphology in schizophrenia patients with a history of violence

Clinical studies of patients with schizophrenia and a history of violence are challenging both from an ethical and practical perspective, and the neurobiological underpinnings remain largely unknown. We here present a comprehensive account of the brain cortical characteristics associated with violence in schizophrenia. We obtained 3T MRI scans and thorough clinical characterization of schizophrenia patients with a history of violence (murder, attempted murder, criminal assault, SCZ-V, n = 11), schizophrenia patients with no history of violence (SCZ-NV, n = 17), and healthy controls (HC, n = 19). Cortical thickness, area, and folding were analyzed vertex-wise across the cortical mantle (FreeSurfer). SCZ-V had significantly increased cortical folding in the visual and orbitofrontal cortex, and reduced cortical thickness within the precentral-, parietal-, temporal-, and fusiform cortex compared to SCZ-NV, as well as widespread regional thinning and increased folding compared to HC. There were no group differences in cortical area. A major limitation is the small subject sample. If replicated, the results from this pilot study suggest cortical abnormalities in areas involved in sensory processing, emotion recognition, and reward to be of importance to the neurobiology of violence in schizophrenia.

Antipsychotic treatment and basal ganglia volumes: Exploring the role of receptor occupancy, dosage and remission status

Antipsychotic treatment may affect brain morphology, and enlargement of the basal ganglia (BG) is a replicated finding. Here we investigated associations between antipsychotic treatment and BG volumes in patients with psychotic and bipolar disorders. We hypothesized that current treatment and, among those medicated, higher dosage, estimated D2R occupancy and being in remission would predict larger BG volumes. Structural covariance analysis was performed to examine if correlations between BG volumes and cortical thickness differed by treatment status. 224 patients treated with antipsychotics; 26 previously treated, 29 never treated and 301 healthy controls (HC) were included from the TOP study cohort (NORMENT, Norway). T1-weighted MR images were processed using FreeSurfer. D2R occupancy was estimated based on serum concentration measurements for patients receiving stable monotherapy. Statistical analyses were adjusted for age, gender and estimated intracranial volume (ICV). We found larger right (p < 0.003) and left putamen (p < 0.02) and right globus pallidus (GP) (p < 0.03) in currently medicated patients compared to HC. Bilateral regional cortical thinning was also observed in currently and previously medicated patients compared to HC. In medicated patients, higher chlorpromazine equivalent dose (CPZ) was associated with larger left GP (p < 0.04). There was no association with estimated D2R occupancy (n = 47) or remission status. Lower positive correlation between left putamen volume and cortical thickness of the left lateral occipital cortex was found in medicated patients compared to HC. We replicated the BG enlargement in medicated patients, but found no association with estimated D2R occupancy. Further studies are needed to clarify the underlying mechanisms.

Positive and general psychopathology associated with specific gray matter reductions in inferior temporal regions in patients with schizophrenia

Schizophrenia is a complex disorder that affects perception, cognition, and emotion causing symptoms such as delusions, hallucinations, and suspiciousness. Schizophrenia is also associated with structural cortical abnormalities including lower gray matter (GM) concentration, GM volume, and cortical thickness relative to healthy control individuals. However, the association between GM measures and symptom dimensions in schizophrenia is still not well understood. Here, we applied parallel independent component analysis (pICA), a higher-order statistical approach that identifies covarying patterns within two (or more) data modalities simultaneously, to link covarying brain networks of GM concentration with covarying linear combinations of the positive and negative syndrome scale (PANSS). In a large sample of patients with schizophrenia (n = 337) the association between these two data modalities was investigated. The pICA revealed a distinct PANSS profile characterized by increased delusional symptoms, suspiciousness, hallucinations, and anxiety, that was associated with a pattern of lower GM concentration in inferior temporal gyri and fusiform gyri and higher GM concentration in the sensorimotor cortex. GM alterations replicate previous findings; additionally, applying a multivariate technique, we were able to map a very specific symptom profile onto these GM alterations extending our understanding of cortical abnormalities associated with schizophrenia. Techniques like parallel ICA can reveal linked patterns of alterations across different data modalities that can help to identify biologically-informed phenotypes which might help to improve future treatment targets.

The debate regarding maintenance treatment with antipsychotic drugs in schizophrenia

Several large meta-analyses of maintenance trials have confirmed that patients who suffer from chronic schizophrenia, randomized to placebo, are likely to experience earlier symptomatic worsening than patients randomized to a dopamine (DA)-blocking drug. These findings led expert groups to issue treatment guidelines, which recommend treatment with DA-blocking drugs for periods ranging from several years to indefinitely. The recommendations were accepted by the majority of, but not all, the experts, some of whom proposed a targeted or intermittent therapy approach by which DA-blocking drugs are discontinued upon symptomatic remission, to be renewed in case of symptom re-emergence. The debate between continued and targeted treatment approaches arises from disagreements regarding scientific and ethical questions. Scientifically, the discussion focuses on the quality and interpretation of the supporting or detracting evidence regarding each treatment option. For example, what is the percentage of individuals who can maintain stability off drugs? What is the rate of individuals who exacerbate despite maintenance treatment? What is the percentage of individuals who experience drug-related adverse effects? How can we interpret results of open-label, nonrandomized targeted trials? Regarding ethical questions, the debating sides disagree on how to weigh the impact of the decreased risk for exacerbation versus the certainty of adverse effects on the patients quality of life, and how to reach a patient-therapist shared decision within the constraints of mental illness.

Cortical thickness correlates of cognitive performance in cognitively-matched individuals with and without schizophrenia

Schizophrenia is characterized by psychosis and, in most cases, cognitive impairment. It is unclear, however, whether these elements of the disorder represent distinct or related disease processes. Accordingly, this study investigated 3-way interactions between group, cognition and cortical thickness in cognitively-matched patients with schizophrenia and healthy control groups. Patients and healthy controls were group-matched on demographics and a broadly-based index of cognitive performance. T1-weighted images were processed using Freesurfer. Variable selection techniques were applied to determine which regions best predicted 3-way interaction effects. Independent variables included age, sex, IQ, and 87 regional cortical thickness values strongly associated with group or cognition. Antipsychotic treatment effects were also investigated. Twenty regions were selected by the best fitting model. The top 6 regions included the left pre- and post-central, left superior frontal and temporal and right rostral and caudal middle frontal cortices. No antipsychotic treatment effects were seen. Cortical thinning in schizophrenia exists even in the absence of cognitive impairment. Our findings support the separation of psychosis and cognitive impairment as independent disease processes, with distinct relations with cortical thickness in prefrontal cortical areas. Parsing out these two disease processes will increase understanding of heterogeneity in schizophrenia and may modify treatment targets.

Ethnopsychopharmacology study of patients' beliefs regarding concerns about and necessity of taking psychiatric medications

OBJECTIVE

The aim of this study was to examine whether or not cultural differences influence beliefs about the necessity of taking prescribed psychiatric drugs and concern about their adverse effects in psychiatric outpatients in Spain, Argentina, and Venezuela.

METHODS

This cross-sectional study included 1,372 adult psychiatric outpatients using 2,438 psychotropic drugs and was designed to assess outpatients' beliefs about their prescribed medication. Patients completed sociodemographic, clinical questionnaires, and the Beliefs about Medicines Questionnaire Specific Scale and registered scores ranging from 1 to 5 on each of two subscales: concern and necessity. A "necessity-concern differential" was obtained by calculating the difference (range -4 to +4).

RESULTS

The global score, including all drugs in the total sample, had a mean necessity score of 3.50 ± 0.95, a mean concern score of 2.97 ± 0.99, and a mean differential score of 0.54 ± 1.42. The concern and necessity mean scores varied significantly across these three culturally Hispanic countries, probably across drug classes, and were associated with treatment duration. On the other hand, age and education played a very limited role.

CONCLUSIONS

Understanding the diverse effects of culture and society on these attitudes is highly relevant for the development of responsive mental health services in multicultural societies.

Personalizing antipsychotic treatment: evidence and thoughts on individualized tailoring of antipsychotic dosage in the treatment of psychotic disorders

Effectiveness of relapse prevention with antipsychotic drugs has been robustly demonstrated. However, the drawbacks of antipsychotic maintenance treatment have prompted alternative strategies to reduce antipsychotic load. A prominent drawback of antipsychotics is their negative impact on subjective well-being, initiative, and drive related to dopamine D2 blockade. This might compromise functional capacity. First-episode studies from 1980 to 2018, including relevant reviews and meta-analyses, are evaluated, showing a lack of functional outcome data. In addition to relapse rates, which is the primary outcome in the great majority of studies, long-term functional outcome is pivotal, because these two outcome domains may point in opposite directions. The trade-off between relapse rates and functional outcome is discussed by our 2013 dose-reduction study. We conclude that divergent outcomes and various individual risk-profiles preclude the construction of a generic outcome measure. The relationship of relapse and functional outcome is considered, as well as the conceivable role of negative symptoms and some related issues. Future profiling of individual risk/benefit characteristics combined with personal preferences may offer better guidance in antipsychotic pharmacotherapy. More studies are needed to elucidate individual risk profiles, predictive of functional capacity and relapse rates, to draw differential conclusions on long-term risks and benefits of antipsychotics across the spectrum of psychosis.

Predictors for Antipsychotic Dosage Change in the First Year of Treatment in Schizophrenia Spectrum and Bipolar Disorders

Background: Use of antipsychotic medication is central in the treatment of psychotic disorders. However, there is limited knowledge about prescription practice of antipsychotics in the critical early phase of these disorders. Clinical guidelines recommend low dosages, but no discontinuation of antipsychotic medication during the first year of treatment in first episode patients. The main aim of this study was to identify clinical predictors for dosage change or discontinuation of antipsychotics during this period. Methods: A total of 426 antipsychotic-using patients with schizophrenia spectrum or bipolar disorder, including both a first treatment sample and a sample of patients with previous treated episodes ("multi-episode" sample) from the same diagnostic groups, underwent thorough clinical and sociodemographic assessment at study baseline and after 1 year. Prescribed dosage levels at baseline and follow-up and change in dosage or discontinuation of antipsychotics from baseline to follow-up were compared between groups, controlling for possible confounders. Results: We found reduced dosages over the first year in both first treatment groups across diagnoses, but not in multi-episode groups. Weight increase predicted dosage reduction in the schizophrenia group, while the level of psychotic symptoms at baseline predicted dosage reduction in the bipolar group. We found higher baseline levels of antipsychotic use in the schizophrenia group than in the bipolar group. Conclusion: We found indications of a trans-diagnostic reduction of prescribed dosages of antipsychotics over the first year in treatment, but with different predictors for this reduction in the two diagnostic groups. The findings increase the understanding of drivers of early medication change in psychotic disorder.

Association between olanzapine treatment and brain cortical thickness and gray/white matter contrast is moderated by cholesterol in psychotic disorders

Altered cortical brain morphology is observed in psychotic disorders. Despite the importance of lipid homeostasis for healthy brain functioning, knowledge about its role in cortical alterations in psychosis is limited. In a sample of patients with psychotic disorders, we investigated the relationship between treatment with olanzapine (OLZ), and cortical thickness and gray/white matter intensity contrast, and the association between these measures and serum lipid levels. We included 33 OLZ users, 19 unmedicated psychotic patients and 76 healthy controls (HC). Data on serum lipids and cortical measures based on MR brain images processed with FreeSurfer were analyzed with General Linear Models. We found that intensity contrast was similar in OLZ users as compared to HC and that the cortex (frontal, orbitofrontal, medial temporal) was thinner in OLZ users (p < 0.05, Bonferroni corrected). An OLZ-specific HDL interaction effect was further found for the pericentral cortical thickness measure (p < 0.05, Bonferroni corrected). Additionally, nominally significant findings indicated similar OLZ-specific interaction effects for cortical thickness in several regions, and an OLZ-specific interaction with LDL for occipital lobe contrast (p < 0.05, uncorrected). Our findings may suggest a drug-related lipid-effect on brain myelination. Experimental studies and replications in different study samples are needed to clarify these complex relationships further.

Antipsychotic and benzodiazepine use and brain morphology in schizophrenia and affective psychoses - Systematic reviews and birth cohort study

The aim of this paper was to investigate differences in brain structure volumes between schizophrenia and affective psychoses, and whether cumulative lifetime antipsychotic or benzodiazepine doses relate to brain morphology in these groups. We conducted two systematic reviews on the topic and investigated 44 schizophrenia cases and 19 with affective psychoses from the Northern Finland Birth Cohort 1966. The association between lifetime antipsychotic and benzodiazepine dose and brain MRI scans at the age of 43 was investigated using linear regression. Intracranial volume, sex, illness severity, and antipsychotic/benzodiazepine doses were used as covariates. There were no differences between the groups in brain structure volumes. In schizophrenia, after adjusting for benzodiazepine dose and symptoms, a negative association between lifetime antipsychotic dose and the nucleus accumbens volume remained. In affective psychoses, higher lifetime benzodiazepine dose associated with larger volumes of total gray matter and hippocampal volume after controlling for antipsychotic use and symptoms. It seems that in addition to antipsychotics, the severity of symptoms and benzodiazepine dose are also associated with brain structure volumes. These results suggest, that benzodiazepine effects should also be investigated also independently and not only as a confounder.

Associations between psychosis endophenotypes across brain functional, structural, and cognitive domains

BACKGROUND

A range of endophenotypes characterise psychosis, however there has been limited work understanding if and how they are inter-related.

METHODS

This multi-centre study includes 8754 participants: 2212 people with a psychotic disorder, 1487 unaffected relatives of probands, and 5055 healthy controls. We investigated cognition [digit span (N = 3127), block design (N = 5491), and the Rey Auditory Verbal Learning Test (N = 3543)], electrophysiology [P300 amplitude and latency (N = 1102)], and neuroanatomy [lateral ventricular volume (N = 1721)]. We used linear regression to assess the interrelationships between endophenotypes.

RESULTS

The P300 amplitude and latency were not associated (regression coef. -0.06, 95% CI -0.12 to 0.01, p = 0.060), and P300 amplitude was positively associated with block design (coef. 0.19, 95% CI 0.10-0.28, p 0.38). All the cognitive endophenotypes were associated with each other in the expected directions (all p < 0.001). Lastly, the relationships between pairs of endophenotypes were consistent in all three participant groups, differing for some of the cognitive pairings only in the strengths of the relationships.

CONCLUSIONS

The P300 amplitude and latency are independent endophenotypes; the former indexing spatial visualisation and working memory, and the latter is hypothesised to index basic processing speed. Individuals with psychotic illnesses, their unaffected relatives, and healthy controls all show similar patterns of associations between endophenotypes, endorsing the theory of a continuum of psychosis liability across the population.