Violent Behavior Prior to Admission Is Not a Factor in Further Prolonged Length of Stay: A Retrospective Cohort Study in a Japanese Psychiatric Hospital.

This study assessed the hypothesis that violent behavior prior to admission prolongs psychiatric hospitalization and evaluated the likelihood of hospital discharge to a community care setting based on demographic and clinical factors, with an emphasis on violent behavior. We retrospectively selected 362 patients who were involuntarily admitted to a psychiatric hospital in Japan from December 1, 2015 to November 30, 2017, stayed longer than planned, and underwent review by a multidisciplinary team. We assessed (a) education and marital status and history of substance abuse, (b) the presence/absence and type of violent behavior that led to hospital admission, and (c) the discharge criteria.

Brain structure differences among male schizophrenic patients with history of serious violent acts: an MRI voxel-based morphometric study.

Background: The biological underpinnings of serious violent behaviors in patients with schizophrenia remain unclear. The aim of this study was to identify the characteristics of brain morphometry in patients with schizophrenia and a history of serious violent acts, who were being treated under relatively new legislation for offenders with mental illness in Japan where their relevant action should be strongly associated with their mental illness. We also investigated whether morphometric changes would depend on types of serious violent actions or not.

Neuropsychological Impairment and Its Association with Violence Risk in Japanese Forensic Psychiatric Patients: A Case-Control Study.

Background: In Japan, the legislation directing treatment of offenders with psychiatric disorders was enacted in 2005. Neuropsychological impairment is highly related to functional outcomes in patients with psychiatric disorders, and several studies have suggested an association between neuropsychological impairment and violent behaviors. However, there have been no studies of neuropsychological impairment in forensic patients covered by the Japanese legislation.

Neurocognitive features in male patients with schizophrenia exhibiting serious violence: a case control study.

Background: The relationship between violence and neurocognitive function in schizophrenia is unclear. We examined the backgrounds and neurocognitive functions of violent and nonviolent patients with schizophrenia to identify factors associated with serious violence.

Methods: Thirty male patients with schizophrenia who were hospitalized after committing serious violent acts were compared with 24 hospitalized male patients with schizophrenia and no history of violence.

An MRI study of septi pellucidi in relation to hippocampus volume and fornix integrity in schizophrenia.

Septum pellucidum (SP) and cavum SP (CSP) were delineated in two samples. The Longitudinal Study examined structural MR-images in first-episode schizophrenia (FESZ) and controls at two time-points. The Cross-Sectional Study examined structural and diffusion-tensor MR measures, including hippocampus and fornix, in chronic schizophrenia (SZ) at one time-point.

Angiotensin II type 1 receptor blockers improve insulin sensitivity in patients with schizophrenia being treated with olanzapine.

Rationale: Olanzapine (OLZ) is known to cause weight gain and metabolic disturbances, which may have serious implications with respect to medical comorbidities such as metabolic syndrome and insulin resistance.

Objectives: The aim of this study was to evaluate the effects of two angiotensin II type 1 receptor blockers (ARBs) which are widely used as antihypertensive agents, valsartan (VAL) and telmisartan (TEL), on insulin resistance in patients with schizophrenia treated with OLZ.

Methods: Thirty inpatients with schizophrenia with OLZ monotherapy over 8 weeks participated in this study.

Progressive and interrelated functional and structural evidence of post-onset brain reduction in schizophrenia.

Context: Progressive brain abnormalities in schizophrenia remain controversial. Evidence of interrelated progressive functional impairment would buttress the case for structural progression. Mismatch negativity (MMN) is reduced in chronic but not first-hospitalized schizophrenia and may index progressive structural changes.

Episodic memory and neuroimaging of hippocampus and fornix in chronic schizophrenia.

A group of 44 patients with schizophrenia and 43 age-matched controls completed psychometrically-matched tasks of recall and recognition. The patients showed similarly depressed scores across both recall and recognition matched tasks, independent of their reduced IQ and executive functioning scores. In addition, reduced memory scores correlated in the expected direction with magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) of the hippocampus and diffusion tension imaging (DTI) of the fornix for subsets of both patients and controls that had available these structural imaging measures.

Occipital lobe gray matter volume in male patients with chronic schizophrenia: A quantitative MRI study.

Schizophrenia is characterized by deficits in cognition as well as visual perception. There have, however, been few magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) studies of the occipital lobe as an anatomically defined region of interest in schizophrenia. To examine whether or not patients with chronic schizophrenia show occipital lobe volume abnormalities, we measured gray matter volumes for both the primary visual area (PVA) and the visual association areas (VAA) using MRI based neuroanatomical landmarks and three-dimensional information.

Middle and inferior temporal gyrus gray matter volume abnormalities in first-episode schizophrenia: an MRI study.

Objective: Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) studies of schizophrenia reveal temporal lobe structural brain abnormalities in the superior temporal gyrus and the amygdala-hippocampal complex. However, the middle and inferior temporal gyri have received little investigation, especially in first-episode schizophrenia.

Method: High-spatial-resolution MRI was used to measure gray matter volume in the inferior, middle, and superior temporal gyri in 20 patients with first-episode schizophrenia, 20 patients with first-episode affective psychosis, and 23 healthy comparison subjects.

Functional and structural deficits in brain regions subserving face perception in schizophrenia.

Objective: Schizophrenia impairs many cognitive functions, including face perception. Veridical face perception is critical for social interaction, including distinguishing friend from foe and familiar from unfamiliar faces. The main aim of this study was to determine whether patients with schizophrenia show less activation in neural networks related to face processing, compared with healthy subjects, and to investigate the relationships between this functional abnormality and anatomical abnormalities in the fusiform gyrus shown with magnetic resonance imaging (MRI).

Fornix integrity and hippocampal volume in male schizophrenic patients.

Background: The hippocampus has been shown to be abnormal in schizophrenia. The fornix is one of the main fiber tracts connecting the hippocampus with other brain regions. Few studies have evaluated the fornix in schizophrenia, however.

Localized volume reduction in prefrontal, temporolimbic, and paralimbic regions in schizophrenia: an MRI parcellation study.

Functional and structural abnormalities of the anterior cingulate gyrus (ACG) in patients with schizophrenia have been repeatedly reported. However, one remaining issue is whether gray matter volume reduction in ACG exists to an extent comparable with, or even in excess of, that in other prefrontal and temporolimbic regions. High-spatial-resolution magnetic resonance imaging was performed on patients with schizophrenia (n=27) and on age-, gender-, and parental socioeconomic-status-matched healthy control subjects (n=27).

Neuroanatomy and neurophysiology in schizophrenia.

Schizophrenia is a major mental disorder, characterized by their set of symptoms, including hallucinatory-delusional symptoms, thought disorder, emotional flattening, and social withdrawal. Since 1980s, advances in neuroimaging and neurophysiological techniques have provided tremendous merits for investigations into schizophrenia as a brain disorder. In this article, we first overviewed neuroanatomical studies using structural magnetic resonance imaging (s-MRI), MR spectroscopy (MRS), and postmortem brains, followed by neurophysiological studies using event-related potentials (ERPs) and magnetoencephalography (MEG), in patients with schizophrenia.