[Relationship between the courses of clinical Features of patients with schizophrenia in adolescents and admission to psychiatric clinic].

In order to improve diagnosis of schizophrenia with onset in adolescents at an early stage, we investigated in detail the clinical features of 74 patients with schizophrenia, (23 males) at adolescents psychiatric clinic. Many of the subjects had been suffering from the illness about 14 years old but had not undergone their first psychiatric examination until a few years later. A high percentage (more than 80%) of our subjects presented psychiatric symptoms such as delusional remembrance, delusional moods, delusions of persecution and hypobulia. Additionally, more than 60% of our subjects presented auditory hallucinations. In general, teenage patients with schizophrenia onset show vague symptoms such as anxiety, embarrassment and strange moods rather than obvious hallucinations. Nevertheless, it was possible to identify certain clinical features of this disorder in adolescents: many patients suffer delusional remembrance, delusional moods and delusions of persecution immediately after the onset of the illness. Gradually, problematic behaviors such as anorexia, self injury, offences against their families, voluntary vomiting, etc., develop, but patients do not always receive psychiatric examination at this stage. After socially obvious problems such as school refusal, withdrawal from social activities and lowering of school record develop over a period of time, patients may be urged to undergo psychiatric examination. Our research again underlines the difficulty of achieving diagnosis of schizophrenia at an early stage. The key to early diagnosis appears to be the accurate identification of psychiatric symptoms in the early stages of the illness at school, or at home if possible, before socially problematic behaviors arise.