title: Sensitivity to change in symptoms of new scales for rating chronic psychotic patients.
abstract: The sensitivity of Krawiecka, Goldberg and Vaughan's scales for rating chronic psychotic patients was established by testing them under conditions comparable to those of a controlled cross-over trial. 34 chronic schizophrenics were assessed on the scales at the beginning, after 6 weeks on one form of medication and after the same period on another drug. Significant changes in ratings of symptom severity of anxiety, hallucination delusions and incoherence were observed in patients who were sympomatic at the outset. Further, patterns of intercorrelations were found to be stable over time. It was concluded that Krawiecka et al.'s scales may be sensitive to change in symptoms in chronic psychotics and that given their known reliability, they may be viable research tools.
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D002908:Chronic Disease; D005069:Evaluation Studies as Topic; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D011569:Psychiatric Status Rating Scales; D011618:Psychotic Disorders / Q000523:psychology*