title: Psychopathological and SPECT findings in never-treated schizophrenia.
abstract: A total of 24 never-treated (i.e. drug-naive) actively psychotic schizophrenic patients, operationalized according to DSM-III-R, were examined in a pre-post-treatment design using the Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale for Schizophrenia (PANSS) and 99mTc-HMPAO-single photon emission computed tomography (SPECT) to assess regional cerebral blood flow (rCBF). The control subjects were 20 patients free of neurological and psychiatric symptoms. Before treatment there was only a slight hypofrontality, and hypoperfusion was observed in the left temporal superior region. After treatment, hypofrontality was reduced to one region and temporal hypoperfusion disappeared. Formal thought disorders were accompanied by increased rCBF in the bilateral frontal interior and left temporal superior regions. Delusions were associated with hypoperfusion in the anterior cingulate cortex. Negative symptoms showed no linkage to hypofrontality, either before or after treatment. Factor analysis showed delusions and hallucinations loading on different dimensions. The disorganized dimension correlated positively with all regions of interest, whereas these were negatively correlated with reality distortion.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry and Psychotherapy, Aachen University of Technology, Germany.
authors.forename: R
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Erkwoh
authors.forename: O
authors.initials: O
authors.lastname: Sabri
authors.forename: E M
authors.initials: EM
authors.lastname: Steinmeyer
authors.forename: U
authors.initials: U
authors.lastname: Bull
authors.forename: H
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Sass
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D014150:Antipsychotic Agents / Q000627:therapeutic use*; D016022:Case-Control Studies; D002540:Cerebral Cortex / Q000187:drug effects / Q000503:physiopathology; D002560:Cerebrovascular Circulation / Q000502:physiology; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D005163:Factor Analysis, Statistical; D005260:Female; D005625:Frontal Lobe / Q000187:drug effects / Q000503:physiopathology; D006179:Gyrus Cinguli / Q000187:drug effects / Q000503:physiopathology; D006801:Humans; D008032:Limbic System / Q000187:drug effects / Q000503:physiopathology; D008137:Longitudinal Studies; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D011936:Reality Testing; D012559:Schizophrenia / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging / Q000188:drug therapy* / Q000503:physiopathology*; D012565:Schizophrenic Psychology; D013702:Temporal Lobe / Q000187:drug effects / Q000503:physiopathology; D015899:Tomography, Emission-Computed, Single-Photon; D016896:Treatment Outcome
chemical_list: D014150:Antipsychotic Agents