Key Takeaways
Extended Takeaways
- In this early-phase schizophrenia cohort, anxiety symptoms were common at 70.6%, but their association with schizophrenia severity was weak, with HAM-A correlations limited to PANSS total (ρ=0.219, P= .004), negative (ρ=0.174, P=.023), and general psychopathology (ρ=0.227, P=.003).
- Depressive symptoms were less prevalent than anxiety at 16.5% but tracked more consistently with illness severity, with HAM-D correlating with PANSS total (ρ=0.394), positive (ρ=0.242), negative (ρ=0.279), and general (ρ=0.439); all P<.001.
- Substance involvement was concentrated in tobacco (31.2%), alcohol (12.9%), cannabis (11.8%), and opioids (5.3%), yet none showed a statistically significant correlation with PANSS scores (P >.05 for all), so substance screening remains important even when it does not mirror cross-sectional psychosis severity.
- All 170 participants had an AIMS score of 0, which the authors attribute to prescreening out patients with significant extrapyramidal symptoms and use of atypical antipsychotics; clinicians should interpret the absence of extrapyramidal symptoms as a sampling feature rather than a typical early-phase schizophrenia profile.
- The sample was clinically representative of an early-course population, with illness duration less than 5 years, average age of 35.17 ± 10.94 years, 58.8% male, 94.1% showing gradual onset, and 85.3% showing a continuous fluctuating course.
