The influence of psychiatric day care on the continuation of treatment for patients with schizophrenia: A retrospective cohort study in Japan

ABSTRACT

We investigated the duration of treatment for patients with schizophrenia depending on the use of psychiatric day care. We divided 927 patients into two groups, namely those who used outpatient and psychiatric day care (DC group), and those who used outpatient only (Non-DC group). The observational period was five years. The Kaplan--Meier method was used for estimating time until discontinuation of treatment. After Propensity score matching 366 subjects (183 in each group) who matched in demographic data were finally selected. Fisher’s exact test indicated there was significant difference in the duration of treatment between the groups (2.91 ± 2.08 years in the Non-DC group vs. 3.47 ± 1.79 years in the DC group). Various programs and professionals in the psychiatric day care may contribute to longer periods of treatment.

KEYWORDS:

• Continuation of treatment
• propensity score matching
• psychiatric day care
• relapse prevention
• rehabilitation
• schizophrenia

Acknowledgments

The authors thank Shioiri Mental Clinic for the support for this study.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.