new drug, Cobenfy<\/a>\u2014a combination of xanomeline and trospium chloride\u2014on top of their usual antipsychotic medications after standard treatments failed to adequately control their symptoms.<\/p>\n\u201cThe new drug targets different receptors in the nervous system than traditional antipsychotic drugs, which mainly block dopamine D2 receptors in the brain,\u201d says Halassa.<\/p>\n
\u201cClinical trials showed the drug worked well compared with a placebo. But clinicians are still assessing how it performs as part of real-world care.\u201d<\/p>\n
Through statistical analyses of two small patient cohorts, Halassa\u2019s exploratory study identified patterns that may help predict who may benefit from the xanomeline-trospium combination therapy and who might not.<\/p>\n
The study analyzed clinical data for 24 patients, identifying several predictive clinical features for individuals who responded, did not respond, or had mixed responses to the addition of the new drug. \u201cA statistical analysis of clinical data from a second group of 25 patients independently replicated these findings, supporting the notion of biologically distinct psychosis subgroups,\u201d says Halassa.<\/p>\n
Patients with prominent \u201cnegative symptoms\u201d\u2014such as social withdrawal, low motivation, or reduced speech\u2014showed the strongest improvements after receiving the new combination drug with their usual antipsychotic medications, including brighter mood and greater social engagement. Those with a history of stimulant use also tended to respond especially well to the new drug.<\/p>\n
In contrast, patients who exhibited aggression or bipolar features (mainly manic symptoms) saw little benefit from adding the new drug to their treatment. Patients with intellectual disabilities also showed limited improvement, though Halassa notes this finding is tentative given the small number of patients with that diagnosis in the study.<\/p>\n
The drug\u2019s effects on other symptoms varied. Some patients with hallucinations improved, but not as consistently or dramatically as those with negative symptoms.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf we start treating every symptom response and non-response as valuable data, we could save individuals and families years of trial and error in finding effective treatment.\u201d<\/p>\n
Halassa says the results suggest schizophrenia may be less a single disease than a collection of conditions\u2014much like a fever or pain\u2014that can stem from different causes and require different treatments. He hopes the findings mark an early step toward the development of precision psychiatry, in which treatment-response patterns help guide care as they already do in other areas of medicine, such as cancer and immunology.<\/p>\n
To shorten the long and uncertain path to recovery for patients with psychosis, he says researchers need to test whether these emerging patient subgroups can truly predict who responds to which treatments. That means running clinical trials that compare medications in people with specific cognitive or biological profiles and tracking the precise trajectories of these symptoms over time.<\/p>\n
Clinicians will also need to track not just whether symptoms improve, but which ones\u2014and under what kind of drug\u2014to drive more personalized treatments.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf we start treating every symptom response and non-response as valuable data, we could save individuals and families years of trial and error in finding effective treatment,\u201d Halassa says.<\/p>\n
Source: Tufts University<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Share this Article You are free to share this article under the Attribution 4.0 International license. A new…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":191356,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[78],"tags":[18,135,19,17,719,8046],"class_list":{"0":"post-191355","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-health","8":"tag-eire","9":"tag-health","10":"tag-ie","11":"tag-ireland","12":"tag-medications","13":"tag-schizophrenia"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/115583936432227740","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/191355","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=191355"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/191355\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/191356"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=191355"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=191355"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=191355"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}