Schizophrenia and hospitalization.

OBJECTIVE

To determine the prevalence of positive and negative symptoms of schizophrenia and the predominant cluster of symptoms leading to hospitalization.

DESIGN

A randomized, retrospective, case-controlled study.

PLACE AND DURATION OF STUDY

Conducted at Government Mental Hospital, Peshawar, from April 2001 to March 2002.

PATIENTS AND METHODS

One hundred cases were randomly (each fifth patient) selected from all the admissions with the DSM-IV diagnosis of schizophrenia, matched controls were randomly (each fifth patient) selected from the outdoor patients. Both sexes were included. PANSS scale was applied to determine the predominant positive and negative symptoms of schizophrenia. An additional aggression risk profile was designed. SPSS version 10 was used for statistical analysis. The applied method for group comparison was the student s t-test.

RESULTS

The mean age of study group was 33.6 +/- 8.93 years, most participants were men, the onset of illness was typically in the late 20's. The study group had predominantly more relapses and history of previous hospitalizations. The PANSS positive and negative score were statistically significant (p-value 0.004 and 0.030) respectively. Composite scores were statistically not significant. The aggression risk profile scores of the study group and controls were statistically significant with (p-value 0.006).

CONCLUSION

The PANSS positive and PANSS negative scores are statistically significant, supporting the notion of two syndromes of positive and negative symptoms of schizophrenia. Aggression risk profile symptoms are positively correlated to hospitalization.