The prospective study of pattern of use of schizophrenia medication in psychiatric clinic / Nurul Izwani Ismail

The aim of the study was to identify the drug prescribing patterns of psychotropic medications for schizophrenia patients at Hospital Tungku Ampuan Rahimah. The retrospective study was conducted in the outpatient pharmacy department. Data collection was based on psychiatric prescription that had been reviewed from 1 August 2008 to 31 August 2008. Out of 371 psychiatric prescriptions that have been reviewed, 200 cases of schizophrenia were included. The mean age was 35 (SD= 1.131) years with a male to female ratio 2. The most widely used oral antipsychotic was haloperidol (20.5%). The most common depot preparation was zuclopenthixol decanoate (11%). The average antipsychotic daily dose prescribe in this clinic was found to be 342.06 mg equivalent of chlorpromazine. There was no difference between dose received by ethnic group (Malay, Chinese or Indian patients) and gender. However there was significance difference between dose antipsychotic drugs and age. Nearly 40 % of schizophrenia patients were prescribed atypical antipsychotic like clozapine, olanzapine, quetipine and resperidone. Mostly the patients were on monotherapy (73%) and only 25.5 % of patients were on combination therapy. The study results show that conventional antipsychotic drug like haloperidol and chlorpromazine were commonly prescribed while the use of atypical drugs was minimal.