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Background:Schizophrenia is a chronic and debilitating psychiatric illness consisting primarily of positive and negative symptoms. However, cognitive deficits in various domains have been consistently replicated in patients with schizophrenia. Therefore, the present study was designed to assess cognitive impairment in schizophrenia and to correlate the same with sociodemographic factors.Materials and Methods:Cognitive function in 100 patients with schizophrenia as per Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition, Text Revision (DSM IV-TR) criteria attending the psychiatry outpatient department (OPD) of Department of Psychiatry, SBKS MIRC was assessed using Addenbrooke's Cognitive Examination Revised (ACER) rating scale and Mini Mental State Examination (MMSE) and sociodemographic details was obtained using semistructured proforma. Data was analyzed by Chi-square and t-test.Results:About 70% patients of schizophrenia were found to have cognitive dysfunction for attention, concentration, memory, language, and executive function. Positive symptoms were associated with memory (P<0.001) and attention impairment (P<0.05). Patients with duration of illness >2 years and belonging to urban habitat showed more cognitive dysfunction. Male patients were associated with impairment in two domains of ACER: Language and memory.Conclusion:The study findings depict that persistent cognitive deficits are seen in patients with schizophrenia. Its correlation with sociodemographic factors showed that patients with >2 years of illness and belonging to urban habitat showed more cognitive dysfunction. Male patients were associated with language and memory impairment. Our study recommends that the neurocognitive impairment should be included in the DSM-V diagnostic criteria for schizophrenia.

There are several reports of reduced levels of polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFA), particularly arachidonic acid (AA) and docosahexaenoic acid (DHA), in membrane phospholipid from various tissues including red blood cells (RBC) taken from schizophrenic patients. However, reports have not been entirely consistent and most studies have been confounded by the potential effects of environmental factors including antipsychotic medication and diet. We measured PUFA levels in RBC from two separate groups of unmedicated patients and control subjects from India and Malaysia, populations which have substantial differences in diet. We found no significant difference in levels of AA between patients and control subjects in either population. Levels of adrenic acid were significantly reduced, and levels of DHA significantly increased in both clinical populations. However, diet-related differences in DHA between the populations from India and Malaysia were much greater than differences between schizophrenic patients and controls. It is concluded that reduced RBC membrane levels of AA and DHA are not pathognomic of schizophrenia but that variations in cell membrane fatty acid levels are an epiphenomenon which may reflect underlying abnormalities of phospholipid and fatty acid metabolism and their interaction with environmental factors including medication and diet.

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Schizophrenia is a common and debilitating mental illness. The disorder is thought to be developmental in origin, with oxidative stress being implicated as possible pathophysiological mechanism. Breath alkanes provide a non-invasive means to assess oxidative stress, with ethane levels reportedly increased in medicated patients with schizophrenia. It is possible, however, that the psychotropic medications used to treat the disorder result in elevated breath ethane levels. We have therefore measured the concentration of ethane and pentane, markers of oxidative stress, in the breath of currently unmedicated patients with schizophrenia. Alveolar breath samples were collected, applied to thermal desorption tubes, and analyzed using a combination of two-stage thermal de-sorption, gas chromatography and mass spectrometry. Compared to healthy controls ethane and pentane levels were found to be elevated in patients with schizophrenia, while levels of butane were normal. Our data support the notion that oxidative stress is increased in schizophrenia and that this is unlikely to be a consequence of antipsychotic medications. In addition, breath alkane analysis may represent a rapid and non-invasive means to monitor oxidative stress occurring in schizophrenia

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