A team of researchers has concluded that older anti-schizophrenia meds are just as effective as the new ones that have hit the market. In a study involving 227 schizophrenia patients, the researchers concluded that a comparison of older and newer drugs failed to show any significant difference either in their quality of life or their use of health resources. New anti-psychotics have been marketed by touting their ability to reduce side effects associated with the older drugs, but the team concluded that the claim has not been backed up by hard scientific data. Researchers want better meds to come up the pipeline.
Jeffrey A. Lieberman, M.D., from the College of Physicians and Surgeons at Columbia University in New York, concluded that the new data shows that newer antipsychotic medications are "not the great breakthrough in therapeutics they were once thought to be."
- read the report in schizophrenia drugs from Ivanhoe