Schizophrenia Research 152 (2014) 530
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Schizophrenia Research journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/schres
Letter to the Editor Why is ITAREPS successful?
Dear Editors, I read with great interest the article that confirms the effectiveness of the ITAREPS program in reducing the need for hospitalizations in patients with schizophrenia (Komatsu et al., 2013). The authors attribute the effect to a temporary increase in medication dose. Adherence to medication increase in patients in the experimental group was ensured by visiting nurses. In the control group, visiting nurses were instructed to conduct “nursing care visits as usual”. Routine nursing care is described as “checking symptoms, recommending early medical examinations, etc.” I am wondering about the extent to which visiting nurses checked medication adherence in the control group patients. Obviously, they did not ask the control patients whether they took additional medication, since none was prescribed. But did they check whether the control patients took all their prescribed medications? Can the authors provide data on medication adherence in both patient groups, for example pill counts? If the nurses' attention to adherence was more consistent in the experimental group than in controls, the interpretation of these very interesting results might be somewhat different than that offered by the authors. A different question pertains to medication dosing. Could the authors supply a brief description of the base doses, perhaps in CPZ equivalents, from which the 20% increase was computed?
0920-9964/$ – see front matter © 2013 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.schres.2013.12.010
Furthermore, the interpretation of the results would be facilitated if the authors provided average cumulative antipsychotic doses (in CPZ equivalent) for each of the two groups during the study. Role of funding source No funding was provided to generate this letter. Contributors There are no contributors. Conflict of interest There is no conflict of interest. Acknowledgment There is nobody to acknowledge.
Reference Komatsu, H., Sekine, Y., Okamura, N., Kanahara, N., Okita, K., Matsubara, S., Hirata, T., Komiyama, T., Watanabe, H., Minabe, Y., Iyo, M., 2013. Effectiveness of Information Technology Aided Relapse Prevention Programme in Schizophrenia excluding the effect of user adherence: a randomized controlled trial. Schizophr. Res. 150, 240–244.
Jan Volavka Corresponding author. Tel.: +1 406 995 2776. E-mail address: [email protected]. 4 September 2013
Contents lists available at ScienceDirect
Schizophrenia Research journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/schres
Letter to the Editor Why is ITAREPS successful?
Dear Editors, I read with great interest the article that confirms the effectiveness of the ITAREPS program in reducing the need for hospitalizations in patients with schizophrenia (Komatsu et al., 2013). The authors attribute the effect to a temporary increase in medication dose. Adherence to medication increase in patients in the experimental group was ensured by visiting nurses. In the control group, visiting nurses were instructed to conduct “nursing care visits as usual”. Routine nursing care is described as “checking symptoms, recommending early medical examinations, etc.” I am wondering about the extent to which visiting nurses checked medication adherence in the control group patients. Obviously, they did not ask the control patients whether they took additional medication, since none was prescribed. But did they check whether the control patients took all their prescribed medications? Can the authors provide data on medication adherence in both patient groups, for example pill counts? If the nurses' attention to adherence was more consistent in the experimental group than in controls, the interpretation of these very interesting results might be somewhat different than that offered by the authors. A different question pertains to medication dosing. Could the authors supply a brief description of the base doses, perhaps in CPZ equivalents, from which the 20% increase was computed?
0920-9964/$ – see front matter © 2013 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.schres.2013.12.010
Furthermore, the interpretation of the results would be facilitated if the authors provided average cumulative antipsychotic doses (in CPZ equivalent) for each of the two groups during the study. Role of funding source No funding was provided to generate this letter. Contributors There are no contributors. Conflict of interest There is no conflict of interest. Acknowledgment There is nobody to acknowledge.
Reference Komatsu, H., Sekine, Y., Okamura, N., Kanahara, N., Okita, K., Matsubara, S., Hirata, T., Komiyama, T., Watanabe, H., Minabe, Y., Iyo, M., 2013. Effectiveness of Information Technology Aided Relapse Prevention Programme in Schizophrenia excluding the effect of user adherence: a randomized controlled trial. Schizophr. Res. 150, 240–244.
Jan Volavka Corresponding author. Tel.: +1 406 995 2776. E-mail address: [email protected]. 4 September 2013
