RESUMO
Prompted by previous reports of substantial clinical improvement in most schizophrenic patients given hemodialysis for their psychiatric condition, we studied the efficacy of hemodialysis in 15 schizophrenic outpatients, under double-blind, controlled conditions. The patients were randomly assigned to either a real-sham or sham-real sequence of dialysis treatment. Results of repeated measurement and other analyses of data on symptoms and behavior that were collected before study treatment, at crossover, and at the end of treatment revealed no difference between the effects of real and sham dialysis. These results provide important experimental evidence of the lack of therapeutic efficacy of hemodialysis in schizophrenia.
Assuntos
Diálise Renal , Esquizofrenia/terapia , Adolescente , Adulto , Ensaios Clínicos como Assunto , Método Duplo-Cego , Feminino , Humanos , Masculino , Pessoa de Meia-Idade , Escalas de Graduação Psiquiátrica , Distribuição Aleatória , Esquizofrenia/diagnósticoRESUMO
The authors describe the results of a survey of 115 psychiatrists regarding assaults by patients. Forty-eight psychiatrists stated that they had been assaulted; a total of 68 assaults was reported. Psychiatrists were most often assaulted in the early stages of their career or while they were working in high-risk settings such as prisons or emergency rooms. Many reported retrospectively that they might have had a role in provoking the assault and that they could have anticipated it. The authors believe that psychiatrists avoid dealing with the issue of violence by patients for a variety of reasons, and they recommend that clinicians learn techniques for managing potentially assaultive patients.
