Brief cognitive assessment instruments in schizophrenia and bipolar patients, and healthy control subjects: A comparison study between the Brief Cognitive Assessment Tool for Schizophrenia (B-CATS) and the Screen for Cognitive Impairment in Psychiatry (SCIP)

Cognitive impairment in schizophrenia and psychosis is ubiquitous and acknowledged as a core feature of clinical expression, pathophysiology, and prediction of functioning. However, assessment of cognitive functioning is excessively time-consuming in routine practice, and brief cognitive instruments specific to psychosis would be of value. Two screening tools have recently been created to address this issue, i.e., the Brief Cognitive Assessment Tool for Schizophrenia (B-CATS) and the Screen for Cognitive Impairment in Psychiatry (SCIP). The aim of this research was to examine the comparative validity of these two brief instruments in relation to a global cognitive score. 161 patients with p…

Diez años de investigación traslacional colaborativa en enfermedades mentales: el CIBERSAM

Neurocognitive diagnosis and cut-off scores of the Screen for Cognitive Impairment in Psychiatry (SCIP-S)

To demonstrate the ability of the Screen for Cognitive Impairment in Psychiatry (SCIP-S) to discriminate between cognitively-impaired individuals and those with adequate functioning in a sample of schizophrenic and bipolar patients, as well as in a control group.The SCIP-S, together with a full neuropsychological battery, was administered to three groups: patients with schizophrenia, patients diagnosed with bipolar disorder I, and controls. The battery scores were used to perform a standardization with respect to the control group and this served to determine the comparison groups (cognitively impaired versus unimpaired) for each of the subtests of the SCIP-S. A full analysis of decision va…

Association of extent of cannabis use and psychotic like intoxication experiences in a multi-national sample of first episode psychosis patients and controls

AbstractBackgroundFirst episode psychosis (FEP) patients who use cannabis experience more frequent psychotic and euphoric intoxication experiences compared to controls. It is not clear whether this is consequent to patients being more vulnerable to the effects of cannabis use or to their heavier pattern of use. We aimed to determine whether extent of use predicted psychotic-like and euphoric intoxication experiences in patients and controls and whether this differs between groups.MethodsWe analysed data on patients who had ever used cannabis (n = 655) and controls who had ever used cannabis (n = 654) across 15 sites from six countries in the EU-GEI study (2010–2015). We used multiple regres…

White Noise Speech Illusions: A Trait-Dependent Risk Marker for Psychotic Disorder?

Supported by the European Community’s Seventh Framework Program under grant agreement No. HEALTH-F2-2009-241909 (Project EU-GEI)

The EUropean Network of National Schizophrenia Networks Studying Gene-Environment Interactions (EU-GEI)

Funder: FP7 Ideas: European Research Council; doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.13039/100011199; Grant(s): HEALTH-F2-2010-241909

Gene-environment interaction as a predictor of early adjustment in first episode psychosis.

Abstract Background This study aims to explore the gene-environment interaction hypothesis applied to pre-symptomatic neurodevelopmental phenotypes of first episode psychosis (FEP), that is, genetic factors might increase vulnerability to the effects of environmental adverse conditions occurring at later stages of development. Methods We constructed a schematic ‘two-hit’ model, with Val/Val homozygosity for the catechol- O -methyltransferase ( COMT ) Val158Met polymorphism as the ‘first hit’ and history of obstetric complications and parental socioeconomic status as ‘second hits’. Early adjustment, measured using the Premorbid Adjustment Scale, was considered the main outcome. The study pop…

Transdiagnostic dimensions of psychopathology at first episode psychosis: findings from the multinational EU-GEI study.

Background\ud The value of the nosological distinction between non-affective and affective psychosis has frequently been challenged. We aimed to investigate the transdiagnostic dimensional structure and associated characteristics of psychopathology at First Episode Psychosis (FEP). Regardless of diagnostic categories, we expected that positive symptoms occurred more frequently in ethnic minority groups and in more densely populated environments, and that negative symptoms were associated with indices of neurodevelopmental impairment.\ud \ud Method\ud This study included 2182 FEP individuals recruited across six countries, as part of the EUropean network of national schizophrenia networks st…

Synergistic effects of childhood adversity and polygenic risk in first-episode psychosis

The European Network of National Schizophrenia Networks Studying Gene-Environment Interactions (EU-GEI) Project is funded by grant agreement HEALTH-F2-2010-241909 (Project EU-GEI) from the European Community’s Seventh Framework Programme.

Migration history and risk of psychosis: results from the multinational EU-GEI study.

The European Network of National Schizophrenia Networks Studying Gene-Environment Interactions (EU-GEI) Project was funded by grant agreement Health-F2-2010-241909 (Project EU-GEI) from the European Community’s Seventh Framework programme.

Perceived major experiences of discrimination, ethnic group, and risk of psychosis in a six-country case-control study

AbstractBackgroundPerceived discrimination is associated with worse mental health. Few studies have assessed whether perceived discrimination (i) is associated with the risk of psychotic disorders and (ii) contributes to an increased risk among minority ethnic groups relative to the ethnic majority.MethodsWe used data from the European Network of National Schizophrenia Networks Studying Gene-Environment Interactions Work Package 2, a population-based case−control study of incident psychotic disorders in 17 catchment sites across six countries. We calculated odds ratios (OR) and 95% confidence intervals (95% CI) for the associations between perceived discrimination and psychosis using mixed-…

Auditory hallucinations in first-episode psychosis: A voxel-based morphometry study

Abstract Background Auditory hallucinations (AH) are a core symptom of psychosis. The brain abnormalities responsible for AH remain controversial due to inconsistent and conflicting findings across studies, with substantial confounding factors, such as chronicity. Few studies have examined the pathological changes that occur in the gray matter (GM) of patients with first-episode psychosis (FEP) and AH. The present study aims to validate the presence and characteristics of these structural abnormalities in relation to the intensity of psychotic symptoms and AH in a larger homogeneous sample than those of previous studies. Methods A magnetic resonance voxel-based morphometric analysis was app…

Examining the independent and joint effects of genomic and exposomic liabilities for schizophrenia across the psychosis spectrum

The EUGEI project was supported by the European Community’s Seventh Framework Program under grant agreement no. HEALTH-F2-2009-241909 (Project EU-GEI). Dr O’Donovan is supported by MRC programme grant (G08005009) and an MRC Centre grant (MR/ L010305/1). Dr Rutten was funded by a VIDI award number 91718336 from the Netherlands Scientific Organisation. Drs Guloksuz and van Os are supported by the Ophelia research project, ZonMw grant number: 636340001. Dr Arango was supported by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation; Instituto de Salud Carlos III (SAM16PE07CP1, PI16/02012, PI19/024); CIBERSAM; Madrid Regional Government (B2017/BMD-3740, AGES-CM-2); Fundación Familia Alonso and Fundac…

jop-2017-3257-File006 – Supplemental material for Impact of NTRK2, DRD2 and ACE polymorphisms on prolactin levels in antipsychotic-treated patients with first-episode psychosis

Supplemental material, jop-2017-3257-File006 for Impact of NTRK2, DRD2 and ACE polymorphisms on prolactin levels in antipsychotic-treated patients with first-episode psychosis by Patricia Gassó, Sergi Mas, Miquel Bioque, Bibiana Cabrera, Antonio Lobo, Ana González-Pinto, Covadonga M. Díaz-Caneja, Iluminada Corripio, Eduard Vieta, Josefina Castro-Fornieles, Salvador Sarró, Anna Mané, Julio Sanjuan, Adrián Llerena, Amalia Lafuente, Jerónimo Saiz-Ruiz, Miguel Bernardo and PEPs Group in Journal of Psychopharmacology

Schizophrenia polygenic risk score and cannabis use modify psychosis expression in first episode psychosis patients and population controls

AbstractBackgroundDiagnostic categories within the psychosis spectrum are widely used in clinical practice, however psychosis may occur on a continuum. Therefore, we explored whether the continuous distribution of psychotic symptoms across categories is a function of genetic as well as environmental risk factors, such as polygenic risk scores (PRSs) and cannabis use.MethodsAs part of the EU-GEI study, we genotyped first episode psychosis patients (FEP) and population controls, for whom transdiagnostic dimensions of psychotic symptoms or experiences were generated using item response bi-factor modelling. Linear regression was used, separately in patients and controls, to test the association…

Age at First Episode Modulates Diagnosis-Related Structural Brain Abnormalities in Psychosis.

Brain volume and thickness abnormalities have been reported in first-episode psychosis (FEP). However, it is unclear if and how they are modulated by brain developmental stage (and, therefore, by age at FEP as a proxy). This is a multicenter cross-sectional case-control brain magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) study. Patients with FEP (n = 196), 65.3% males, with a wide age at FEP span (12-35 y), and healthy controls (HC) (n = 157), matched for age, sex, and handedness, were scanned at 6 sites. Gray matter volume and thickness measurements were generated for several brain regions using FreeSurfer software. The nonlinear relationship between age at scan (a proxy for age at FEP in patients) and…

Cuando la asistencia no sigue a la evidencia: el caso de la falta de programas de intervención temprana en psicosis en España

Resumen Actualmente existe evidencia suficiente que avala la importancia de las intervenciones en fases tempranas de la psicosis. El retraso en la deteccion y el tratamiento del primer episodio psicotico se asocia con una recuperacion menor y mas lenta, asi como con un riesgo mayor de recaidas. A pesar de ello, todavia no se han implementado de forma regular programas de intervencion temprana en los servicios de salud mental en Espana. En este articulo de opinion se revisaran los principales argumentos que nos permitan defender la necesidad de la implementacion de estos programas y las estrategias a seguir para cumplir con este objetivo. Existen actualmente programas de intervencion tempran…

NORMATIVE DATA OF THE SCIP-S IN SCHIZOPHRENIA AND TYPE I BIPOLAR DISORDER

Duration of untreated psychosis in first-episode psychosis is not associated with common genetic variants for major psychiatric conditions: results from the multi-center EU-GEI Study

The EU-GEI Project is funded by the European Community’s Seventh Framework Programme under grant agreement No. HEALTH-F2-2010–241909 (Project EU-GEI).

jop-2017-3257-File005 – Supplemental material for Impact of NTRK2, DRD2 and ACE polymorphisms on prolactin levels in antipsychotic-treated patients with first-episode psychosis

Supplemental material, jop-2017-3257-File005 for Impact of NTRK2, DRD2 and ACE polymorphisms on prolactin levels in antipsychotic-treated patients with first-episode psychosis by Patricia Gassó, Sergi Mas, Miquel Bioque, Bibiana Cabrera, Antonio Lobo, Ana González-Pinto, Covadonga M. Díaz-Caneja, Iluminada Corripio, Eduard Vieta, Josefina Castro-Fornieles, Salvador Sarró, Anna Mané, Julio Sanjuan, Adrián Llerena, Amalia Lafuente, Jerónimo Saiz-Ruiz, Miguel Bernardo and PEPs Group in Journal of Psychopharmacology

Utility of the World Health Organization Disability Assessment Schedule II in schizophrenia.

The World Health Organization Disability Assessment Schedule II (WHODAS II) was developed for assessing disability. This study provides data on the validity and utility of the Spanish version of the WHODAS II in a large sample of patients with schizophrenia.The sample included 352 patients with a schizophrenia spectrum disorder. They completed a comprehensive assessment battery including measures of psychopathology, functionality and quality-of-life. A sub-sample of 36 patients was retested after six months to assess its temporal stability.Participation in society (6.3%) and Life activities (4.0%) were the domains with the highest percentage of missing data. The internal consistency (Cronba…

Childhood Maltreatment, Educational Attainment, and IQ: Findings From a Multicentric Case-control Study of First-episode Psychosis (EU-GEI).

[Background and hypothesis] Evidence suggests that childhood maltreatment (ie, childhood abuse and childhood neglect) affects educational attainment and cognition. However, the association between childhood maltreatment and Intelligence Quotient (IQ) seems stronger among controls compared to people with psychosis. We hypothesised that: the association between childhood maltreatment and poor cognition would be stronger among community controls than among people with first-episode of psychosis (FEP); compared to abuse, neglect would show stronger associations with educational attainment and cognition; the association between childhood maltreatment and IQ would be partially accounted for by ot…

Spanish version of the Screen for Cognitive Impairment in Psychiatry (SCIP-S): psychometric properties of a brief scale for cognitive evaluation in schizophrenia.

The Screen for Cognitive Impairment in Psychiatry (SCIP) is a brief scale designed for detecting cognitive deficits in several psychotic and affective disorders. This study examined the psychometric properties of the Spanish version of the SCIP in a sample of outpatients suffering schizophrenia-spectrum disorders.Psychometric properties were evaluated in a sample of 126 stable patients with schizophrenia. Men and women 18 to 55 years of age were recruited from consecutive admissions to 40 psychiatric outpatient clinics in Spain and asked to complete a series of cognitive measures at baseline, as well as three versions of the SCIP separated by one week intervals. A matched sample of 39 healt…

The relationship of symptom dimensions with premorbid adjustment and cognitive characteristics at first episode psychosis: Findings from the EU-GEI study

Premorbid functioning and cognitive measures may reflect gradients of developmental impairment across diagnostic categories in psychosis. In this study, we sought to examine the associations of current cognition and premorbid adjustment with symptom dimensions in a large first episode psychosis (FEP) sample. We used data from the international EU-GEI study. Bifactor modelling of the Operational Criteria in Studies of Psychotic Illness (OPCRIT) ratings provided general and specific symptom dimension scores. Premorbid Adjustment Scale estimated premorbid social (PSF) and academic adjustment (PAF), and WAIS-brief version measured IQ. A MANCOVA model examined the relationship between symptom di…

A replication study of JTC bias, genetic liability for psychosis and delusional ideation

The EUGEI project was supported by the European Community's Seventh Framework Program under grant agreement No. HEALTH-F2-2009-241909 (Project EU-GEI). Dr O'Donovan is supported by MRC programme grant (G08005009) and an MRC Centre grant (MR/L010305/1)

Estimating Exposome Score for Schizophrenia Using Predictive Modeling Approach in Two Independent Samples: The Results From the EUGEI Study

The EUGEI project was supported by the grant agreement HEALTH-F2-2010-241909 from the European Community’s Seventh Framework Programme. The authors are grateful to the patients and their families for participating in the project. They also thank all research personnel involved in the GROUP project, in particular J. van Baaren, E. Veermans, G. Driessen, T. Driesen, E. van’t Hag and J. de Nijs. Bart PF Rutten was funded by a VIDI award number 91718336 from the Netherlands Scientific Organisation.

Pre-training inter-rater reliability of clinical instruments in an international psychosis research project.

International audience

Impact of NTRK2, DRD2 and ACE polymorphisms on prolactin levels in antipsychotic-treated patients with first-episode psychosis.

Background: Hyperprolactinemia is a common side-effect of antipsychotics (APs), which may trigger serious secondary problems and compromise the adherence to treatment which is crucial for prognosis, especially in patients presenting with a first-episode of psychosis (FEP). Aims: We evaluated, in some cases for the first time, the effect of polymorphisms in multiple candidate genes on serum prolactin (PRL) levels in an AP-treated FEP cohort recruited in the multicenter PEPs study (Phenotype − genotype and environmental interaction; Application of a predictive model in first psychotic episodes). Methods: PRL concentration was measured in serum from 222 patients. A total of 167 polymorphisms w…

Jumping To Conclusions, General Intelligence, And Psychosis Liability: Findings From The Multi-Centre EU-GEI Case-Control Study

AbstractBackgroundThe “jumping to conclusions” (JTC) bias is associated with both psychosis and general cognition but their relationship is unclear. In this study, we set out to clarify the relationship between the JTC bias, IQ, psychosis and polygenic liability to schizophrenia and IQ.Methods817 FEP patients and 1294 population-based controls completed assessments of general intelligence (IQ), and JTC (assessed by the number of beads drawn on the probabilistic reasoning “beads” task) and provided blood or saliva samples from which we extracted DNA and computed polygenic risk scores for IQ and schizophrenia.ResultsThe estimated proportion of the total effect of case/control differences on J…

Treated Incidence of Psychotic Disorders in the Multinational EU-GEI Study

Importance: Psychotic disorders contribute significantly to the global disease burden, yet the latest international incidence study of psychotic disorders was conducted in the 1980s. Objectives: To estimate the incidence of psychotic disorders using comparable methods across 17 catchment areas in 6 countries and to examine the variance between catchment areas by putative environmental risk factors. Design, Setting, and Participants: An international multisite incidence study (the European Network of National Schizophrenia Networks Studying Gene-Environment Interactions) was conducted from May 1, 2010, to April 1, 2015, among 2774 individuals from England (2 catchment areas), France (3 catch…

Use of multiple Polygenic Risk Scores for distinguishing Schizophrenia-spectrum disorder and Affective psychosis categories; the EUGEI study

ABSTRACTSchizophrenia (SZ), Bipolar Disorder (BD) and Depression (D) run in families. This susceptibility is partly due to hundreds or thousands of common genetic variants, each conferring a fractional risk. The cumulative effects of the associated variants can be summarised as a polygenic risk score (PRS). Using data from the EUGEI case-control study, we aimed to test whether PRSs for three major psychiatric disorders (SZ, BD, D) and for intelligent quotient (IQ) as a neurodevelopmental proxy, can discriminate affective psychosis (AP) from schizophrenia-spectrum disorder (SSD). Participants (573 cases, 1005 controls) of european ancestry from 17 sites as part of the EUGEI study were succes…

The EUropean Network of National Schizophrenia Networks Studying Gene-Environment Interactions (EU-GEI): Incidence and First-Episode Case-Control Programme. Soc Psychiatry Psychiatr Epidemiol

Purpose: The EUropean Network of National Schizophrenia Networks Studying Gene-Environment Interactions (EU-GEI) study contains an unparalleled wealth of comprehensive data that allows for testing hypotheses about (1) variations in incidence within and between countries, including by urbanicity and minority ethnic groups; and (2) the role of multiple environmental and genetic risk factors, and their interactions, in the development of psychotic disorders. Methods: Between 2010 and 2015, we identified 2774 incident cases of psychotic disorders during 12.9 million person-years at risk, across 17 sites in 6 countries (UK, The Netherlands, France, Spain, Italy, and Brazil). Of the 2774 incident…

O3.1. ASSOCIATION OF EXTENT OF CANNABIS USE AND ACUTE INTOXICATION EXPERIENCES IN A MULTI-NATIONAL SAMPLE OF FIRST EPISODE PSYCHOSIS PATIENTS AND CONTROLS

Background FEP patients who use cannabis experience more frequent intoxication experiences compared to controls. It is not clear whether this is consequent to patients being more vulnerable to the effects of cannabis use or to their heavier pattern of use. We aimed to determine whether extent of use predicted psychotic-like and euphoric intoxication experiences in FEP patients and controls and whether this differs between groups. Methods We analysed data on lifetime cannabis using patients (n=655) and controls (n=654) across 15 sites from six countries in the EU-GEI study (2010–2015). We used multiple regression to model predictors of cannabis-induced experiences and Factorial ANOVA to dete…

Clinical usefulness of the screen for cognitive impairment in psychiatry (SCIP-S) scale in patients with type I bipolar disorder

Abstract Background The relevance of persistent cognitive deficits to the pathogenesis and prognosis of bipolar disorders (BD) is understudied, and its translation into clinical practice has been limited by the absence of brief methods assessing cognitive status in Psychiatry. This investigation assessed the psychometric properties of the Spanish version of the Screen for Cognitive Impairment in Psychiatry (SCIP-S) for the detection of cognitive impairment in BD. Methods After short training, psychiatrists at 40 outpatient clinics administered the SCIP three times over two weeks to a total of 76 consecutive type I BD admissions. Experienced psychologists also administered a comprehensive ba…

P-1294 - Utility of the world health organization disability assessment schedule II in schizophrenia

Aim The World Health Organization Disability Assessment Schedule II (WHODAS II) was developed for assessing disability. This study provides data on the validity and utility of the Spanish version of the WHODAS II in a large sample of patients with schizophrenia. Methods The sample included 352 patients with a schizophrenia spectrum disorder. They completed a comprehensive assessment battery including measures of psychopathology, functionality and quality-of-life. A sub-sample of 36 patients was retested after six months to assess its temporal stability. Results Participation in society (6.3%) and Life activities (4.0%) were the domains with the highest percentage of missing data. The intern…

Influence of social cognition as a mediator between cognitive reserve and psychosocial functioning in patients with first episode psychosis

This work was supported by the Carlos III Institute of Health and European Fund for Regional Development (PI08/1213, PI11/01977, PI14/01900, PI08/01026, PI11/02831, PI14/01621, PI08/1161, PI16/00359, PI16/01164, PI18/00805), the Basque Foundation for Health Innovation and Research (BIOEF), the Secretaria d´Universitats I Recerca del Departament d´Economia I Coneixement (2017 SGR 1365), and R&D activities in Biomedicine, Madrid Regional Government and Structural Funds of the European Union (S2017/BMD-3740 (AGES-CM 2-CM)).

The independent and combined influence of schizophrenia polygenic risk score and heavy cannabis use on risk for psychotic disorder: A case-control analysis from the EUGEI study.

Background: Some recent studies have challenged the direction of causality for the association between cannabis use and psychotic disorder, suggesting that cannabis use initiation is explained by common genetic variants associated with risk of schizophrenia. We used data from the European Union Gene-Environment Interaction consortium (EUGEI) case-control study to test for the independent and combined effect of heavy cannabis use, and of Schizophrenia Polygenic risk score (SZ PRS), on risk for psychotic disorder. Methods: Genome-wide data were obtained from 492 first episode psychosis patients (FEPp) and from 787 controls of European Ancestry, and used to generate SZ PRS from the summary res…

When the healthcare does not follow the evidence: The case of the lack of early intervention programs for psychosis in Spain

Abstract There is now sufficient evidence to support the importance of interventions in the early stages of psychosis. The delay in the detection and treatment of the first-episode psychosis is related to a lower and slower recovery, as well as a higher risk of relapse. Despite this fact, early intervention units or teams are still not regularly implemented in mental health service settings in Spain. In this opinion article, a review is presented of the main arguments for defending the need to implement these programmes and strategies in order to achieve this aim. There are a number of programmes for early intervention for psychosis currently working in other countries, with a therapeutic p…

Jumping to conclusions, general intelligence, and psychosis liability: Findings from the multi-centre EU-GEI case-control study

This study was funded by the Medical Research Council, the European Community’s Seventh Framework Program grant [agreement HEALTH-F2-2009-241909 (Project EU-GEI)], São Paulo Research Foundation (grant 2012/0417-0), the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Biomedical Research Centre (BRC) at South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust and King’s College London, the NIHR BRC at University College London and the Wellcome Trust (grant 101272/Z/12/Z).

The prevention of relapses in first episodes of schizophrenia: The 2EPs Project, background, rationale and study design.

Up to 80% of first-episode psychosis patients suffer a relapse within five years of the remission. Relapse should be an important focus of prevention given the potential harm to the patient and family. It threatens to disrupt their psychosocial recovery, increases the risk of resistance to treatment and has been associated with greater direct and indirect costs for society. Based on a previous project entitled "Genotype-phenotype and environment. Application to a predictive model in first psychotic episodes" (PEPs Project), the project "Clinical and neurobiological determinants of second episodes of schizophrenia. Longitudinal study of first episode of psychosis" was designed, also known as…

Disability in bipolar I disorder: the 36-item World Health Organization Disability Assessment Schedule 2.0.

Abstract Background The WHODAS 2.0 is an ICF-based multidimensional instrument developed for measuring disability. The present study analyzes the utility of the 36-item interviewer-administered version in a sample of patients with bipolar disorder. There is no study to date that analyses how the scale works in a sample that only comprises such patients. Methods A total of 291 patients with bipolar disorder (42.6% males) according to DSM-IV-TR criteria from a cross-sectional study conducted in outpatient psychiatric clinics were enrolled. In addition to the WHODAS 2.0, patients completed a comprehensive assessment battery including measures on psychopathology, functionality and quality of li…

Social disadvantage, linguistic distance, ethnic minority status and first-episode psychosis: Results from the EU-GEI case-control study

The European Network of National Schizophrenia Networks Studying Gene-Environment Interactions (EU-GEI) Project was funded by grant agreement Health-F2-2010-241909 (Project EU-GEI) from the European Community’s Seventh Framework programme. The Brazilian study was funded by grant 2012-0417-0 from the São Paulo Research Foundation. Dr Jongsma is funded by the Economic and Social Research Council (grant ES/S011714/1). Dr Kirkbride is funded by the Wellcome Trust and Royal Society (Grant 101272/Z/13/Z). Dr Jongsma and Professor Jones are funded by the National Institute of Health Research Collaboration of Leadership in Applied Health Research and Care East of England. Professor Rutten is funded…

Evidence, and replication thereof, that molecular-genetic and environmental risks for psychosis impact through an affective pathway

AbstractBackgroundThere is evidence that environmental and genetic risk factors for schizophrenia spectrum disorders are transdiagnostic and mediated in part through a generic pathway of affective dysregulation.MethodsWe analysed to what degree the impact of schizophrenia polygenic risk (PRS-SZ) and childhood adversity (CA) on psychosis outcomes was contingent on co-presence of affective dysregulation, defined as significant depressive symptoms, in (i) NEMESIS-2 (n = 6646), a representative general population sample, interviewed four times over nine years and (ii) EUGEI (n = 4068) a sample of patients with schizophrenia spectrum disorder, the siblings of these patients and controls.ResultsT…

Assessment and management of agitation in psychiatry: Expert consensus

International audience; BACKGROUND:Psychomotor agitation is associated with different psychiatric conditions and represents an important issue in psychiatry. Current recommendations on agitation in psychiatry are not univocal. Actually, an improper assessment and management may result in unnecessary coercive or sedative treatments. A thorough and balanced review plus an expert consensus can guide assessment and treatment decisions.METHODS:An expert task force iteratively developed consensus using the Delphi method. Initial survey items were based on systematic review of the literature. Subsequent surveys included new, re-worded or re-rated items.RESULTS:Out of 2175 papers assessing psychomo…

Smoking does not impact social and non-social cognition in patients with first episode psychosis.

Abstract Background Many studies having shown significant improvements in non-social and social cognitive performance in smoking FEP patients compared to non-smoking FEP patients. The findings are controversial. This study analyzed the effects of tobacco use on non-social and social cognitive function in a large group of FEP patients and a matched healthy control group. Methods A sample of 335 patients with FEP and 253 healthy controls was divided into four subgroups: control tobacco users (CTU), control non-tobacco users (CNTU), patient tobacco users (PTU) and patient non-tobacco users (PNTU). Demographic variables, tobacco use variables (presence or absence, frequency and duration of toba…

Early Parental Death and Risk of Psychosis in Offspring: A Six-Country Case-Control Study

Evidence for early parental death as a risk factor for psychosis in offspring is inconclusive. We analyzed data from a six-country, case-control study to examine the associations of early parental death, type of death (maternal, paternal, both), and child’s age at death with psychosis, both overall and by ethnic group. In fully adjusted multivariable mixed-effects logistic regression models, experiencing early parental death was associated with 1.54-fold greater odds of psychosis (95% confidence interval (CI): 1.23, 1.92). Experiencing maternal death had 2.27-fold greater odds (95% CI: 1.18, 4.37), paternal death had 1.14-fold greater odds (95% CI: 0.79, 1.64), and both deaths had 4.4…

The screen for cognitive impairment in psychiatry: diagnostic-specific standardization in psychiatric ill patients

Abstract Background The Screen for Cognitive Impairment in Psychiatry (SCIP) is a simple and easy to administer scale developed for screening cognitive deficits. This study presents the diagnostic-specific standardization data for this scale in a sample of schizophrenia and bipolar I disorder patients. Methods Patients between 18 and 55 years who are in a stable phase of the disease, diagnosed with schizophrenia, schizoaffective disorder, schizophreniform disorder, or bipolar I disorder were enrolled in this study. Results The SCIP-S was administered to 514 patients (57.9% male), divided into two age groups (18–39 and 40–55 years) and two educational level groups (less than and secondary or…

Examining facial emotion recognition as an intermediate phenotype for psychosis: Findings from the EUGEI study

The EUGEI project was supported by the European Community’s Seventh Framework Program under grant agreement No. HEALTH-F2- 2009-241909 (Project EU-GEI). Dr. Arango was supported by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation; Instituto de Salud Carlos III (SAM16-PE07CP1, PI16/02012, PI19/024); CIBERSAM (...)

Use of multiple polygenic risk scores for distinguishing schizophrenia-spectrum disorder and affective psychosis categories in a first-episode sample; the EU-GEI study

This work was supported by funding from the European Community’s Seventh Framework Programme under grant agreement No. HEALTH-F2-2010-241909 (Project EU-GEI). (...) CA was supported by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation; Instituto de Salud Carlos III (SAM16PE07CP1, PI16/02012, PI19/024), co-financed by ERDF Funds from the European Commission, ‘A way of making Europe’, CIBERSAM. Madrid Regional Government (B2017/BMD-3740 AGES-CM-2), Fundación Familia Alonso and Fundación Alicia Koplowitz. MB was supported by the Ministry of Economy and Competitivity (PI08/0208; PI11/00325; PI14/00612), Instituto de Salud Carlos III – ERDF Funds from the European Commission, ‘A way of making Europ…

The Independent Effects of Psychosocial Stressors on Subclinical Psychosis: Findings from the Multinational EU-GEI Study

The influence of psychosocial stressors on psychosis risk has usually been studied in isolation and after the onset of the disorder, potentially ignoring important confounding relationships or the fact that some stressors that may be the consequence of the disorder rather than preexisting. The study of subclinical psychosis could help to address some of these issues. In this study, we investigated whether there was (i) an association between dimensions of subclinical psychosis and several psychosocial stressors including: childhood trauma, self-reported discrimination experiences, low social capital, and stressful life experiences, and (ii) any evidence of environment-environment (ExE) inte…

The incidence of psychotic disorders among migrants and minority ethnic groups in Europe: findings from the multinational EU-GEI study

AbstractBackgroundIn Europe, the incidence of psychotic disorder is high in certain migrant and minority ethnic groups (hence: ‘minorities’). However, it is unknown how the incidence pattern for these groups varies within this continent. Our objective was to compare, across sites in France, Italy, Spain, the UK and the Netherlands, the incidence rates for minorities and the incidence rate ratios (IRRs, minorities v. the local reference population).MethodsThe European Network of National Schizophrenia Networks Studying Gene–Environment Interactions (EU-GEI) study was conducted between 2010 and 2015. We analyzed data on incident cases of non-organic psychosis (International Classification of …

Replication of previous genome-wide association studies of psychiatric diseases in a large schizophrenia case-control sample from Spain.

Genome wide association studies (GWAS) has allowed the discovery of some interesting risk variants for schizophrenia (SCZ). However, this high-throughput approach presents some limitations, being the most important the necessity of highly restrictive statistical corrections as well as the loss of statistical power inherent to the use of a Single Nucleotide Polymorphism (SNP) analysis approach. These problems can be partially solved through the use of a polygenic approach. We performed a genotyping study in SCZ using 86 previously associated SNPs identified by GWAS of SCZ, bipolar disorder (BPD) and autistic spectrum disorder (ASD) patients. The sample consisted of 3063 independent cases wit…

Examining the association between exposome score for schizophrenia and functioning in schizophrenia, siblings, and healthy controls: results from the EUGEI study

European Community's Seventh Framework Program, European Commission [HEALTH-F2-2009-241909]; Scientific and Technological Research Council of Turkey, 2219 International Postdoctoral Research Fellowship Program; Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation, Instituto de Salud Carlos III (SAM16PE07CP1, PI16/02012, and PI19/024)...

The contribution of cannabis use to variation in the incidence of psychotic disorder across Europe (EU-GEI): a multicentre case-control study.

Background: Cannabis use is associated with increased risk of later psychotic disorder but whether it affects incidence of the disorder remains unclear. We aimed to identify patterns of cannabis use with the strongest effect on odds of psychotic disorder across Europe and explore whether differences in such patterns contribute to variations in the incidence rates of psychotic disorder. Methods: We included patients aged 18–64 years who presented to psychiatric services in 11 sites across Europe and Brazil with first-episode psychosis and recruited controls representative of the local populations. We applied adjusted logistic regression models to the data to estimate which patterns of canna…

Identifying gene-environment interactions in schizophrenia: contemporary challenges for integrated, large-scale investigations

European Community Recent years have seen considerable progress in epidemiological and molecular genetic research into environmental and genetic factors in schizophrenia, but methodological uncertainties remain with regard to validating environmental exposures, and the population risk conferred by individual molecular genetic variants is small. There are now also a limited number of studies that have investigated molecular genetic candidate gene-environment interactions (G x E), however, so far, thorough replication of findings is rare and G x E research still faces several conceptual and methodological challenges. in this article, we aim to review these recent developments and illustrate h…