Obsessive-compulsive disorder in first episode and chronic schizophrenic patients

Familial aggregation of schizophrenia‐spectrum disorders and obsessive‐compulsive associated disorders in schizophrenia probands with and without OCD

“…Moreover, the rate of OCD-schizophrenia in relatives of OCD-schizophrenia probands was 26.6% (4 of 15 relatives). This rate is similar to the prevalence of OCD in schizophrenia patients in recent studies on schizophrenia-OCD comorbidity [Berman et al, 1998;Tibbo et al, 2000;Poyurovsky et al, 2001]. Overall, the present study found that OCD-schizophrenia is to some degree familial, i.e., if a patient suffers from OCD-schizophrenia his/ her first-degree relatives have an increased risk for OCDschizophrenia (or vice versa).…”

“…Although the recognition of obsessive-compulsive symptoms (OCS) in schizophrenia is challenging, recent reports clearly indicate that OCS can be reliably identified in schizophrenia patients. A considerable base rate of OCS/OCD in schizophrenia (7%-25%) has been demonstrated in both epidemiological and clinical samples [Fenton and McGlashan, 1986;Eisen et al, 1997;Bermanzohn et al, 2000;Poyurovsky et al, 2001;Nechmad et al, 2003]. Moreover, OCS are apparently not a sequel to chronic illness, hospitalization or neuroleptic treatment, since a comparable rate of OCD (14%) has been noted in first-episode, predominantly drug-naíve schizophrenia patients [Poyurovsky et al, 1999].…”