Schizoaffective psychosis. I. Comparative long-term outcome.

Patients from the Chestnut Lodge (Rockville, Md) follow-up study with schizoaffective (SA) psychosis (n = 68) were compared with patients with DSM-III schizophrenia (S, n = 163), bipolar disorder (n = 19), and unipolar disorder (n = 44) on multiple premorbid, morbid, and outcome dimensions. This study required that patients with SA disorder satisfy DSM-III criteria for both S and affective disorder (minus mutual exclusionary criteria). The SA cohort demographic and premorbid profile paralleled that of the cohort with unipolar disorder. At follow-up, however, the profile of SA psychosis paralleled that of S, with no significant differences between these patients on virtually all outcome measures. Results suggest that among samples of long-term inpatient, SA psychosis as defined herein is closer to S than affective disorder.