Year: 2018
Type: conference-paper
Abstract: Schizophrenia is associated with high morbidity as compared to the general population or to matched controls.The aim of this presentation is to address the roll of somatic comorbidities in the high mortality rates of patients with schizophrenia.Recent mortality data will be presented based on the analyses of nationwide full population registries (Canada (Gatov et al. 2017) and Hungary (Bitter et al. 2017)) or large cohorts.The roll of antipsychotic treatment in the survival of patients with schizophrenia will be presented by using nationwide, registry based data from Finland (Tiihonen et al. 2009) and Sweden (Tiihonen et al. 2015).The Hungarian nationwide data show a 2.4 times increased risk of death in schizophrenia as compared to matched (age, sex and postal code) controls; the Canadian nationwide data show, that "mortality rates among people with schizophrenia were 3 times higher than among those without schizophrenia".The Hungarian data indicate a large risk increase in the younger groups of patients (RR=13 below the age of 20 years and RR=6.4 in the age group >20 -<40 years).While the sex ratio of mortality rates in schizophrenia has a similar pattern as in the general population (higher mortality for males than females), the risk increase of death of female patients with schizophrenia is higher those of male patients.The largest increases in the risk of death as compared to matched controls were found in the case of the following comorbidities: Acute lower respiratory infections; External causes of morbidity and mortality (according to the International Statistical Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems 10 th Revision (ICD-10)-WHO Version, 2016); Other infections; Neoplasms.Based on Finish and Swedish nationwide data antipsychotic treatment as compared to no antipsychotic treatment decreases mortality in schizophrenia.The large increase of comorbidities and the higher rate of mortality associated with comorbidities in schizophrenia call for an improvement of graduate and postgraduate medical education and training and for new preventive actions, such as smoking cessation programs for patients with schizophrenia.
Institution: Medical University of Graz
Language: English
Subfield: Psychiatry and Mental health
Field: Medicine
Domain: Health Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W3207357994