Evidence-based treatment for schizophrenia

Abstract

Taken together, the research on what treatments help people with schizophrenia point to the value of treatment programs that combine medications with a range of psychosocial services. Provision of such packages of services likely reduces the need for crisis-oriented care hospitalizations and emergency room visits and enables greater recovery. For most people with schizophrenia, the combination of psychopharmacological and psychosocial interventions improves outcomes. Several psychosocial treatments have demonstrated efficacy. These include family intervention, supported employment, assertive community treatment, skills training, and CBT. In the same way that psychopharmacologic management must be tailored individually to the needs and preferences of the patient, so too should the selection of psychosocial treatments. At the very least, all people with schizophrenia should be provided with education about their illness. Beyond illness education, all of the recommended psychosocial interventions would be used rarely during any one phase of illness for an individual. Some psychosocial treatments share treatment components, and patients have different clinical and social needs at different points in their illness course. Knowledge regarding how best to combine treatments to optimize outcomes is scarce.