Thursday, 21 August 2003
This presentation is part of : Late Onset Schizophrenia: New Wine in Old Bottle

S082-003 Long-Term Outcome of Late Onset Schizophrenia: A Five-Year Follow-up Study

Perminder S Sachdev1, Henry Brodaty2, Annette Koschera2, and B. Cullen3. (1) Psychiatry, University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia, (2) Academic Department for Old Age Psychiatry, Prince of Wales Hospital, Sidney Australia, Australia, (3) Mercer’s Institute for Research on Ageing, Dublin, Ireland

Background: There is controversy about whether late-onset schizophrenia (LOS) is a precursor to cognitive decline.

Aims: To examine the long-term outcome of a group of patients with LOS.

Method: Subjects with DSM-III-R schizophrenia onset ³ 50 years and no dementia and healthy controls were assessed at baseline (n = 27 and 34 respectively), after one and five years (n = 19 and 24 respectively) on measures of psychopathology, cognition and general functioning, and compared on rates of decline and incidence of dementia.

Results: Nine LOS patients and no controls were found to have dementia (5 AD, 1 VaD, 3 dementia of unknown type) at 5-year follow-up. There appeared to be a sub-group of LOS patients without signs of dementia at baseline or 1-year follow-up who subsequently declined in function.

Conclusions: LOS may be a prodrome of Alzheimer-type dementia. The nosological status of LOS will be discussed in the light of this and other longitudinal studies.

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