title: A clinical study of neurological soft signs in patients with schizophrenia.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  Neurological soft signs (NSSs) are "objectively measured, nonlocalizing abnormalities, not related to impairment of a specific brain region, reflecting improper cortical-subcortical and intercortical connections." The possibility of NSS as an endophenotype in schizophrenia has been studied across the globe. We aimed at finding the prevalence of NSS among patients with schizophrenia as well as the associations of NSS between various sociodemographic and illness variables.
  
  
  METHODS
  One hundred patients between the age group of 16 and 60 years were serially selected from the inpatient department of a tertiary care hospital who have been diagnosed as a case of schizophrenia according to the International Classification of Diseases version 10 during 1 year period. A semi-structured pro forma was used to collect various demographic as well as illness data, and subjects were clinically evaluated for NSS using neurological evaluation scale.
  
  
  RESULTS
  The prevalence of NSSs was found to be 67%, significant association was found between NSS and age, occupation, and duration of illness. A statistically significant correlation was found between NSS and age, NSS and duration of illness.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The validity of NSS as an endophenotype lies in the fact that it should be independent of all sociodemographic and illness variables. However, our study evaluated some statistically significant findings between them. Hence, further researches are required with properly adjusted controls to find if the associations obtained between NSS and different variables here are true or whether there are some confounding factors included.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Pt. Jawaharlal Nehru Memorial Medical College, Raipur, Chhattisgarh, India.
authors.forename: Mithun
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Dutta
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Silchar Medical College and Hospital, Silchar, Assam, India.
authors.forename: Kamal
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Nath
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Lokopriya Gopinath Bordoloi Regional Institute of Mental Health, Tezpur, Assam, India.
authors.forename: Aparajeeta
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Baruah
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Silchar Medical College and Hospital, Silchar, Assam, India.
authors.forename: Subrata
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Naskar
keywords: Demographics; endophenotype; neurological soft signs; schizophrenia