Treatment of negative symptoms of schizophrenia using repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation in a double-blind, randomized controlled study
| Authors | |
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| Year of publication | 2007 |
| Type | Article in Periodical |
| Magazine / Source | Schizophrenia Research |
| MU Faculty or unit | |
| Citation | |
| Field | Psychiatry, sexuology |
| Keywords | negative symptoms; rTMS; Schizophrenia; Therapy |
| Description | Twenty two schizophrenic patients on stable antipsychotic medication with prominent negative symptoms were included into the trial. They were divided into two groups: eleven of them were treated with effective rTMS and eleven with ineffective sham rTMS. The inefficacy of sham rTMS was achieved through stimulation coil position. Stimulation was applied to the left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex. Stimulation frequency was 10Hz. Stimulation intensity was 110% of the motor threshold intensity. Each patient received 15 rTMS sessions on 15 consecutive working days. Each daily session consisted of 15 trains of 10 seconds duration and 30 seconds intertrains intervals. It means 1500 stimuli per session. During real rTMS treatment the statistical significant decrease of negative symptoms was found (about 29% in negative subscale PANSS and 50% in SANS). No adverse events occured during therapy except of mild headache. In sham rTMS treatment the decrease of negative symptoms was found too, but was lesser than in real rTMS (about 7% in negative subscale PANSS and 13% in SANS). The change in SANS reached statistical significance. Mutual comparison revealed the greater decrease of negative symptoms in favour of real rTMS in contrast to sham rTMS. The augmentation of rTMS meant for patients decrease of the significance of the negative symptoms. The explanation of this state can be seen in the posibility of the rTMS to influence patophysiologic basis of negative symptoms in different way then it was by antipsychotics. Our result supports the therapeutic potential of rTMS at higher frequency for negative symptoms of schizophrenia. |
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