title: A comparison of adolescent- and adult-onset first-episode, non-affective psychosis: 2-year follow-up.
abstract: This study aimed to compare 2-year outcome among individuals with early-onset (EO; <18 years) versus adult-onset (AO) first-episode, non-affective psychosis. We compared clinical and treatment characteristics of 43 EO and 189 AO patients 2 years after their inclusion in a clinical epidemiologic population-based cohort study of first-episode psychosis. Outcome variables included symptom severity, remission status, drug abuse, treatment utilization, cognition and social functioning. At baseline, EO patients were more symptomatically compromised. However, these initial baseline differences were no longer significant at the 2-year follow-up. This study challenges the findings of a larger and older literature base consisting primarily of non-comparative studies concluding that teenage onset indicates a poor outcome. Our results indicate that adolescent-onset and adult-onset psychosis have similar prognostic trajectories, although both may predict a qualitatively different course from childhood-onset psychosis.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Regional Centre for Clinical Research in Psychosis, Stavanger University Hospital, Norway. jhl@sus.no
authors.forename: Johannes
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Langeveld
authors.forename: Inge
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Joa
authors.forename: Svein
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Friis
authors.forename: Wenche
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: ten Velden Hegelstad
authors.forename: Ingrid
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Melle
authors.forename: Jan O
authors.initials: JO
authors.lastname: Johannessen
authors.forename: Stein
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Opjordsmoen
authors.forename: Erik
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Simonsen
authors.forename: Per
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Vaglum
authors.forename: Bjørn
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Auestad
authors.forename: Thomas
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: McGlashan
authors.forename: Tor K
authors.initials: TK
authors.lastname: Larsen
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D017668:Age of Onset; D000368:Aged; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008137:Longitudinal Studies; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D011569:Psychiatric Status Rating Scales; D011618:Psychotic Disorders / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000628:therapy*; D012189:Retrospective Studies; D012565:Schizophrenic Psychology; D055815:Young Adult