The effects of switching from oral to LAI antipsychotic treatment on subjective experience of schizophrenic and schizoaffective patients: Preliminary results

Abstract

Our preliminary results suggest that the switch from oral to LAI antipsychotic treatment may help to address the subjective core of an optimal and satisfying recovery of psychotic patients. Size and duration of this study need to be expanded in order to produce more solid and generalizable results.

Changes in attitude towards LAI antipsychotic maintenance treatment: A two-year follow-up study

“…Changes in patients' psychopathology (in terms of severity of symptoms) were evaluated by expert clinicians who had no therapeutic relationship with any of the participants they assessed, in order to create an objective reference background to address patients' subjective experience of treatment and its relationship with reported functional outcomes. With regard to efficacy on symptoms, we found significant improvements of psychometric indexes one year after the switch to LAI antipsychotic treatment, with no significant changes during the second year, indicating that the overall improvement in psychopathology largely depends on the early phases of LAI-AMT, as previously suggested [35,36]. The significant decrease of mean PANSS total score (p < .001) is particularly valuable in clinical practice, since a reduction of at least 25% from baseline is considered as a clinically useful effect [46].…”

“…Moreover, SGA-LAIs seem to be associated with better subjective experience compared to first-generation depot formulations [24,25]. Although patients' attitude towards LAIs before their use is often influenced by negative beliefs about this formulation [26][27][28], only a few studies evaluated the impact of switching to a SGA-LAI on PROs [29][30][31][32][33][34][35][36]. In this regard, our LAI-FE study (LAIs on Functioning and Experience), ongoing at the University of Florence, provided some evidence of an improved subjective experience with SGA-LAIs in the shortterm [35,36].…”

“…Although patients' attitude towards LAIs before their use is often influenced by negative beliefs about this formulation [26][27][28], only a few studies evaluated the impact of switching to a SGA-LAI on PROs [29][30][31][32][33][34][35][36]. In this regard, our LAI-FE study (LAIs on Functioning and Experience), ongoing at the University of Florence, provided some evidence of an improved subjective experience with SGA-LAIs in the shortterm [35,36]. Such lower propensity of LAI antipsychotic formulations to cause adverse subjective experiences could be due to their peculiar pharmacokinetic and pharmacodynamic characteristics (they allow to control titration to effective dose, to steady plasma drug levels, to avoid first-pass metabolism and to guarantee delivery of medication [7,8]), as well as to other individual and environmental treatment-related factors (i.e.…”

LAI versus oral: A case-control study on subjective experience of antipsychotic maintenance treatment

“…a significant role has been recently assigned to the notion of subjective well-being and quality of life in patients undergoing AMT [16][17][18].…”

“I live, I don't work, but I live a very normal life”—A qualitative interview study of Scandinavian user experiences of schizophrenia, antipsychotic medication, and personal recovery processes

“…Knowledge of service user perspectives on the antipsychotic treatment of schizophrenia is limited . A number of studies have compared oral treatment with long‐acting injections (LAIs) . This previous research has primarily been based on surveys of user satisfaction and measures of quality of life.…”