Neuropsychological, olfactory, and hygiene deficits in men with negative symptom schizophrenia

Abstract

Associations between symptom subtypes, life skills, olfactory identification, and neuropsychological ability were investigated in patients with schizophrenia and related to observations of poor personal hygiene and implied functional compromise of orbitofrontal integrity. Twenty-seven men with chronic schizophrenia were assessed using the Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale for Schizophrenia and the Life Skills Profile. Performance on the University of Pennsylvania Smell Identification Test (UPSIT), the Modified Wisconsin Card Sorting Test (MWCST), delayed response/alternation, and memory tasks derived from the Wechsler Memory Scale-Revised (WMS-R) was also compared to that of an age-, sex-, and IQ-matched control group. Patient UPSIT, MWCST, and WMS-R performance was significantly impaired in comparison to controls. Poor UPSIT performance and poor self-care were significantly associated with negative symptoms. Also, UPSIT ability was associated with performance on the MWCST in both patients and controls, whereas an association with performance on the WMS-R was only found in normal subjects rather than in the patients with schizophrenia. The importance of these findings to postulated mechanisms involving prefrontal rather than mediotemporal lobe (MTL) function in schizophrenia are discussed, as is the relevance of the use of smell identification ability to subtype identification and rehabilitative strategies.