Review of treatments that can ameliorate nonadherence in patients with schizophrenia.

Nonadherence to medication is one of the major problems in treating patients with schizophrenia. Clinicians can use a variety of assessment strategies to identify patients who are nonadherent, although none of these is completely reliable. Interventions to improve adherence include psychosocial strategies, second-generation oral antipsychotics, and long-acting injectable antipsychotics. Because of the potential for reduced relapse and rehospitalization rates and the availability of second-generation antipsychotics in injectable form, a case is made for using long-acting injectable second-generation antipsychotics, when appropriate, to treat patients with schizophrenia.