Effective treatment of coprophagia in a patient with schizophrenia with the novel atypical antipsychotic drug perospirone.

Here we report on a patient with schizophrenia who suffered from medication-refractory coprophagia. Although there were few cases in which psychotropic medication was effective against coprophagia, we encountered a patient with schizophrenia in whom coprophagia rapidly disappeared after treatment with perospirone, a novel atypical antipsychotic drug of the serotonin-dopamine antagonist (SDA) type. Perospirone has a uniquely high affinity for serotonin-1A receptors, and it could be speculated that perospirone, as a serotonin-1A receptor agonist combined with SDA, may have greater efficacy for treatment-refractory symptoms of schizophrenia. Thus, perospirone is an agent with possible efficacy for medication-refractory schizophrenia.