Prevalence of Smoking in a Group of Patients with the First Episode ofSchizophrenia

Overview

Previously published studies reported an increased prevalence of smoking among patients withchronic schizophrenia. It has been suggested that smoking may be affected by antipsychotictreatment. Therefore, it can be expected that there is no such an effect of antipsychotics onsmoking in first-episode schizophrenics. We hypothesized that prevalence of smoking amongpatients with first-episode schizophrenia is not different from the prevalence in the generalpopulation of the Czech Republic. The study subjects were first-episode schizophrenic admittedto the Prague Psychiatric Centre during the period from January 1997 to August 1999. Inclusioncriteria were ICD-10 diagnosis of schizophrenia or an acute psychotic disorder with symptoms ofschizophrenia, and treatment with antipsychotics for less than 30 days. The subjects were assig-ned into the following groups according their status at the time of admission: smokers, non-smo-kers, treated with antipsychotics, and drug-naive. Subjects in the control group were respondentsfrom the 1996 survey (data provided by the Institute of Health Information and Statistics). Fis-her’s exact test was used for analyses. We found a significantly higher prevalence of smoking inmale study subjects, as compared to the control group (p=0.00172). No statistically significantdifference was detected between female study subjects and controls. Possible effects of smokingin schizophrenia are discussed.

Key words:
smoking, schizophrenia, nicotine addiction.