Drug therapy:

• STRENGTH:

  • evidence to support their effectiveness
  • Supports the idea that both typical and atypical antipsychotics are moderately effective in tackling the symptoms
  • Thornley et al reviewed studies comparing the effects of chlorpromazine to control conditions
  • Data from 13 trials with a total of 1121 pp showed that chlorpromazine was associated with better overall functioning and reduced symptom severity as compared to placebo

  This means that, as far as we can tell, antipsychotics work.
• COUNTERPOINT:

  • Healy suggested serious flaws with evidence for effectiveness
  • IE most studies are of short-term effects only and some successful trials have had their data published multiple times, exaggerating the size of the evidence base for positive effects
  • Antipsychotics have powerful calming effects it is easy to demonstrate that they have some positive effect on people experiencing the symptoms of schizo
  • Not the same as saying they really reduce the severity of psychosis

  This means that the evidence base for antipsychotic effectiveness is less impressive than it first appears.
• LX

  • antipsychotics is that we don't know why they work
  • Understanding the mechanism which drugs work is tied up with the OG dopamine hypothesis - the idea that symptoms are linked to high levels of DA activity in the subcortex of the brain
  • Now know that this OG dopamine hypothesis is a partial explanation for schizo and that DA levels in other parts of the brain are too low rather than too high
  • If this is true then most antipsychotics should not work
  • There're questions of the effectiveness of antipsychotics to the argument that they're ineffective

  May not be the best treatment to opt for