Comparison of efficacy of timiperone, a new butyrophenone derivative, and clocapramine in schizophrenia: a multiclinic double-blind study.

The clinical efficacy and safety of timiperone, a new butyrophenone derivative, on chronic schizophrenia was compared with clocapramine by the double-blind method using a total of eighty-eight patients, consisting of forty-four patients in each group. In the final global improvement rating, the global improvement rating in each week and the general usefulness rating, there were no statistically significant differences between the two groups. However, in the global improvement rating in each symptom, timiperone was significantly superior to clocapramine in delusion and showed a superior tendency to clocapramine in contact. Timiperone showed a higher improvement rate than clocapramine in hallucination and disturbance of self-consciousness. In the over-all safety rating, there were no significant differences between the two groups, but in accompanying symptoms and side-effects, timiperone showed significantly less tendency than clocapramine in dyskinesia, insomnia, constipation and nausea. From these results, including the analysis by stratification, it was considered that timiperone was a superior or equivalent neuroleptic in comparison with clocapramine against the negative symptoms as well as the positive ones of chronic schizophrenia, and was equally safe or safer than clocapramine.