A rational approach to employing high plasma levels of antipsychotics for violence associated with schizophrenia: case vignettes

CNS Spectr. 2014 Oct;19(5):432-8. doi: 10.1017/S1092852914000236. Epub 2014 May 27.

Abstract

Forensic psychiatric settings contain a high prevalence of treatment-resistant violent schizophrenia patients. Clozapine therapy has the most robust data for the management of violence in patients with schizophrenia, but for those who cannot tolerate or refuse clozapine, high-dose antipsychotic treatment to high achieve high plasma levels remains a viable option despite limited evidence for efficacy in controlled trials. This article enumerates rational guidelines for employing high plasma level strategies, emphasizing the appropriate interpretation of, and reaction to high plasma antipsychotic levels in these treatment resistant patients, and the need to push treatment to the limits of tolerability or clinical response.

Publication types

  • Case Reports
  • Review

MeSH terms

  • Adult
  • Antipsychotic Agents / administration & dosage*
  • Antipsychotic Agents / blood
  • Drug Monitoring
  • Female
  • Haloperidol / administration & dosage*
  • Haloperidol / blood
  • Humans
  • Male
  • Middle Aged
  • Schizophrenia / drug therapy*
  • Schizophrenic Psychology
  • Treatment Failure
  • Violence / prevention & control*
  • Violence / psychology

Substances

  • Antipsychotic Agents
  • Haloperidol