Course and prognosis of childhood schizophrenia

Abstract

Follow-up data on 57 schizophrenic patients, including 25 boys and 32 girls between the ages of 7 and 13, is reported. Average length of follow-up was 15 years. Symptoms found in children under 10 and in prepubertal cases are described. Cases with acute, relapsing episodes occurred more often than chronic cases, but before age 11 acute cases were less frequent. Twenty percent of the patients recovered completely, 30% reached a relatively good social adjustment, and 50% had moderate or poor remission. Family incidence of psychiatric disorders had no influence on prognosis, nor did unfavorable family environment. Premorbid personality development was, however, found to be of prognostic value. Prodromal episodes occurred in 55% of the cases, and 65% of the patients were preoccupied by death. Additional follow-up findings are presented, and problems of diagnosis are discussed.

The ESSEN study of childhood-onset schizophrenia: Selected results

“…Especially rare are follow-up studies of schizophrenic psychoses with early onset, most of them had a relatively short observation time between 1 and 5 years (3,11,12,35,39,46,47). This is due to the extremely low frequency of COS (age ≤ 14 years), the prevalence is about 0.14 : 1000.…”

“…Schizophrenic psychoses can be diagnosed reliably in children using the same criteria as for adults (2,12,17,40,44,45). The use of comparable criteria across age facilitates analyses of progressive symptomatology from childhood to adulthood.…”

“…The use of comparable criteria across age facilitates analyses of progressive symptomatology from childhood to adulthood. However, there are important differences between early-onset and late-onset schizophrenia: The former may be characterized by poor pre-morbid adjustment, a predominance of insidious versus acute onset, and poor prognosis (3,11,12).…”

Auditory Laterality and Selective Attention: Normal Performance in Patients With Early-Onset Schizophrenia

“…Thus, the differences between our DL test results and the results of other studies may be due to the difference in prognosis of the patients. There have been only limited studies on adolescent-onset schizophrenia, but results suggest that it runs a variety of courses (recovery, relapsing, chronic) rather similar to the adult forms (Eggers 1978(Eggers , 1989Werry et al 1991).…”

Childhood and Adolescent Schizophrenia and Other Early-Onset Psychoses

“…Eggers points to the risk of suicide in the prodromal state and growing suicidal risk with onset of schizophrenia; where 65% of adolescents were preoccupied by death thoughts, 20% attempted suicide and 5% committed suicide. Compared to adults, suicide was relatively late phenomena, with the average time of 8.5 years between the onset of schizophrenia and the attempted suicide, and the average time between 6 and 14 years for the committed suicide (Eggers, 1978). In general, the prognosis for the early-onset schizophrenia is as follows: the earlier the onset, the greater the disability (Remschmidt, 2001).…”