Multicenter study on the effects of day care therapy on schizophrenia: a comparison of day care patients with outpatients.

The effects of day care therapy for a period of 6 months upon patients with schizophrenia were studied through comparison with schizophrenia outpatients at four facilities in Japan. The clinical features of the 31 day care patients and 30 outpatients were evaluated by the hospital staff using the Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale (PANSS) and Global Assessment Scale (GAS), and by the patients' close relatives using the Katz Adjustment Scale (KAS) before and after 6 months of treatment. Day care patients showed a significant decrease in the general pathological score of PANSS and GAS, but outpatients did not show any comparable improvement. As for KAS scores, similar improvement was observed for both the day care patients and outpatients After 6 months, 43% of the day care patients improved on the post-/pre- PANSS total scores ratio, as against only 13% of the outpatients. In addition, 13% of the outpatients were readmitted due to an exacerbation of their symptoms, whereas all day care patients were able to remain at home for 6 months. This study clearly demonstrated that day care therapy for patients with schizophrenia was more effective than the usual outpatients treatment setting. Further therapeutic efforts (e.g. psycho-education) in day care therapy are needed in order to improve family member's evaluation of the patient.