Psicosis

Salud Mental 2008;31:479-485

Impacto de la duración de la psicosis no tratada

Impacto de la duración de la psicosis no tratada (DPNT) en el curso y pronóstico de la esquizofrenia
Isis García,1 Ana Fresán,2 María Elena Medina-Mora,3 Gabriela Mariana Ruiz1
Actualización por temas

SUMMARY
The duration of Untreated Psychosis (DUP), defined as the period of time between the onset ofpsychotic symptoms, such as hallucinations and delusions, and the first effective treatment, has been associated to prognosis of schizophrenia. It has been demonstrated that although psychotic symptoms are initially detected by relatives of patients with schizophrenia, they take a long time to seek specialized attention, which in turn leads to a delay in the diagnosis and treatment of the disorder.Schizophrenia has been considered by the World Health Organization as a public health problem and has been placed as the ninth cause of incapacity in the world. Thus, DUP represents part of this public health problem. In Mexico, the average DUP lasts 64 weeks, which is very similar to the average observed in other countries, where the mean DUP in psychotic patients varies between one and two years.One of the main reasons of a prolonged DUP is that patients and their families first assist with a general practitioner which, in many cases, does not perform an adequate diagnosis with the subsequent referral to a psychiatric facility, and the treatment given for the patient is based on sedative medication. This is also Mexico’s case, where seeking help primarily involves religious groups, withvery few referrals to psychiatric facilities and with inadequate treatment support, which delays care in specialized services. It has been established that early treatment is related to a better prognosis and outcome, while treatment delay has been related to a longer time to achieve symptom remission. These results support the hypothesis that the presence of psychotic symptoms for a long period oftime may predispose to biological damage, which may in turn lead to predominant negative symptoms and severe cognitive deficits after the first psychotic episode. Also, some studies have found that a longer DUP is related to a more insidious illness onset, frequent relapses and psychiatric hospitalizations during the course of the disorder, with a poor response to antipsychotic medication. Throughthe use of neuroimaging, several studies have found the relation between DUP and brain morphology in patients with schizophrenia. Studies using Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) have reported that patients with longer DUP show a significant reduction in the gray matter of the temporal planum, in the left middle, inferior temporal, left occipital and left fusiform cortices, with an increase ofgrey matter in the left basal ganglia, and a volume reduction of the caudate nucleus. These results may be related to the clinical course of the disorder in terms of a higher symptom severity and poor treatment response. In regard to psychosocial variables related to DUP it has been , observed that men have a longer DUP when compared to women and patients that are single and unemployed also have alonger DUP . Consequently, it has been found that there is a relationship between DUP and premorbid adjustment in patients with schizophrenia. Premorbid adjustment is defined as the psychosocial functioning in the educational, occupational, social and interpersonal relations areas before the evidence of positive characteristic symptomatology, where symptoms are not secondary to an organic cause andcover a period of six months before the first psychiatric hospitalization or contact with a psychiatric facility. In addition, it has been found that a prolonged DUP is related to a poor premorbid adjustment, especially during late adolescence and adulthood. This association may suggest the presence of prodromic symptoms secondary to the physiopathological process of psychosis. Consequently, if...