Schizophrenia is associated with wide-ranging disability across multiple functional domains. There are several determinants of disability that have been identified to date, including cognitive and social cognitive impairments, impairments in everyday functional skills and social skills, difficulties in self-assessment of abilities, and negative symptoms. These impairments are related to different elements of disability, and disability and its predictors are not a single global dimension. Further, although psychotic symptoms have limited cross-sectional correlations with everyday functioning, emerging evidence suggests that long-term clinical stability, often induced through treatment with long-acting antipsychotic medications, is also associated with improvements in everyday functioning. This review addresses the characteristics and origins of disability, with treatment implications noted in each disability domains.
Mis-estimation of social cognitive ability was an important predictor of social and nonsocial outcomes in schizophrenia compared to performance on social cognitive tests. These results suggest that consideration of self-assessment is critical when attempting to evaluate the causes of disability and when trying to implement interventions targeting disability reduction.
A growing body of research has shown that two domains of cognition, neurocognition and social cognition, predict different domains of real-world outcomes in people with schizophrenia. Social cognition has been shown to predict social outcomes but not non-social outcomes (e.g. living independently), and neurocognition provides minimal prediction of social outcomes (e.g. interpersonal relationships). The differing predictive value of neurocognition and social cognition has led to an exploration of potential factors that interact with cognition to influence everyday outcomes. Functional skills, negative symptoms, and self-assessment have shown particularly promising relationships with cognitive ability. Several consensus studies have pinpointed valid performance-based assessments. High-contact informant ratings have additionally been shown to be highly accurate. The emerging understanding of divergent patterns of predicting outcomes and reliable assessments present an opportunity to improve treatment targets and real-world outcomes for individuals with schizophrenia. In particular, a recently defined component of metacognition has shown particular promise. Introspective accuracy (IA) addresses how well individuals evaluate their own abilities. Emerging research has found that IA of neurocognitive ability better predicts everyday functional deficits than scores on performance-based measures of neurocognitive skills and has found that IA of social cognition accounts unique variance in real world disability above social cognitive abilities. Intriguingly, IA of neurocognition appears to preferentially predict non-social outcomes while IA of social cognition predicts social outcomes.
Introduction.
Individuals with schizophrenia present across a spectrum of symptomatology. Disability remains a debilitating reality across varying disease presentations and remains pervasive despite psychiatric medications. Cognition (neuro/social cognition) and negative symptoms have emerged as the strongest predictors of real-world disability, but account for <50% of the variance in outcomes.
Methods.
Our attempts to determine what accounts for the remaining 50% of variance has shown that poor introspective accuracy (IA) may be the most potent predictor of functional outcomes 25% of individuals with schizophrenia. We define IA as the adequacy of self-assessments of ability, skills, performance, or decisions. We suggest that IA is a progression of metacognition and can extend beyond cognition to include misestimation of prior and likely future performance in social or other adaptively relevant situations.
Results.
Additionally, IA is bidirectional and self-orientated. Emerging research has found that IA of neurocognitive ability better predicts everyday functional deficits than scores on performance-based measures or neurocognitive skills and has found that IA of social cognition accounts unique variance in real-world disability above social cognitive performance.
Discussion.
We argue that impaired IA, affecting 25–50% of patients with schizophrenia, in the absence or minimal presence of other impairments might be the most powerful predictor of functional outcomes.
BACKGROUND Most pediatric elevated blood pressure (BP) remains undiagnosed. The American Academy of Pediatrics states ''there is limited evidence to support school-based measurement of children's BP.'' We explored the utility school-based BP screening.METHODS A cross-sectional sample of 4096 students ages 6 to 17 from Title 1 Miami-Dade Public Schools (50% female, 71% non-Hispanic black, 26% Hispanic) had their systolic/diastolic BP (SBP/DBP) and body mass index (BMI) collected over the 2016 to 2017 or 2017 to 2018 school years. Relative risks (RRs) ratios were calculated to estimate normal/elevated SBP/DBP by BMI percentile, ethnicity, and sex.
RESULTSOverall, 26.4% had at least one elevated BP measurement, of which 59% were not obese. RR for obese status was significant for all categories of elevated BP (RRs > 1.88, p < .0001). Being either female (RR = 1.34, p = .009) or Hispanic (RR = 1.31, p = .014) was significantly associated with elevated DBP. BMI accounted for <10% of the variation in BP (SBP: F(1, 4095) = 367.6, adjusted R 2 = .08, p < .0001; DBP: F(1, 4095) = 93.3, adjusted R 2 = .02, p < .0001).CONCLUSION These findings support providing BP screenings in school settings. Low-income and minority students often have limited access to health care, higher obesity rates, and unhealthy behaviors. Our findings support universal school-based BP screening regardless of weight status, particularly among ethnically diverse populations.Keywords: school-based clinics; school health policy; child and adolescent health; pediatric hypertension; blood pressure; obesity.Citation: Silberstein J, Gwynn L, Mathew MS, Arheart KL, Messiah SE. Evidence to support universal blood pressure screening in school-based clinical settings.
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