Psychiatry Research EG

Background Although patients with late-onset schizophrenia (LOS) represent a minority among the elderly population, they account for a disproportional amount of services and costs. Unfortunately, there have been very few attempts to identify this problem in Egypt. Objectives To compare the sociodemographic, daily living, functioning, and cognitive impairment between patients with LOS and matched mentally healthy elderly controls. Participants and methods A cross-sectional comparative study was carried out; we selected 50 patients with schizophrenia with onset after the age of 50 years (group 1) and 50 matched healthy controls (group 2). All patients were interviewed using the Structured Clinical Interview for DSM Axis-I diagnosis for diagnosis, Functional assessment of daily living, section B (CAMCOG) of the Cambridge Mental Disorders of the Elderly Examination, the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale, and Fahmy and El-Sherbini’s Social Classification Scale. The control group was chosen on the basis of assessment using the General Health Questionnaire and these participants were assessed for cognitive and functional abilities. Results There were no significant differences between patients and controls in age, sex, social class, and educational level; however, significantly more patients were never married (54%) or divorced (62%), and living alone (62%) compared with participants in the control group who were married (56%) or widowed (34%), and living with sponsors (52%) or children (28%). Patients had significantly more chest diseases, auditory impairment, musculoskeletal problems, and gastrointestinal diseases than their healthy counterparts. LOS patients were insignificantly worse in daily living functioning compared with controls. Cognitive assessment showed that patients scored significantly worse in cognitive functions as estimated by CAMGOG on the following items: global cognition, language, memory, praxis, abstract, and perception items; moreover, they scored significantly lower in most of the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale items compared with the matched healthy controls, who scored within the average norms on all cognitive items. Conclusion Patients with late-onset schizophrenia, compared with mentally healthy elderly controls, differ in a number of psychosocial, daily functioning, and cognitive abilities. The results of this study provide a better understanding of an elderly patient population with late-onset schizophrenia. This research is an essential step toward direct future provision of services to this neglected group