Although non-adherence is common across all branches of medicine, psychotic disorders pose additional challenges that increase its risk. Despite the importance of non-adherence, clinicians generally spend too little time on assessing and addressing adherence attitudes and behaviors. Importantly, how adherence is measured significantly impacts the findings, and the most frequently employed methods of asking patients or judging adherence indirectly based on efficacy or tolerability information have poor validity. Novel technologies are being developed that directly assess adherence and that can also be used to both provide real-time feedback to clinicians and serve as an intervention with patients. Several treatments are available that can positively impact adherence. Among psychosocial interventions, those combining multiple approaches and involving multiple domains seem to be most effective. Although long-acting injectable antipsychotics are theoretically a very powerful tool to assure adherence and signal non-adherence, recent results from randomized controlled trials failed to show superiority compared to oral antipsychotics. These data are in contrast to nationwide cohort studies and mirror-image studies, which arguably include more representative patients receiving long-acting antipsychotics in clinical practice. This disconnect suggests that traditional randomized controlled trials are not necessarily the best way to study interventions that are thought to work via reducing non-adherence. Clearly, non-adherence is likely to remain a major public health problem despite treatment advances. However, increasing knowledge about factors affecting adherence and leveraging novel technologies can enhance its early assessment and adequate management, particularly in patients with psychotic disorders.

Recent, large, randomized controlled trials (RCTs) showed no benefit of long-acting injectable (LAI) antipsychotics over oral antipsychotics in preventing relapse in schizophrenia, nor did a recent meta-analysis incorporating these studies. However, RCTs might enroll a disproportionate number of patients with better treatment adherence and lower illness severity. Mirror-image studies, which compare periods of oral antipsychotic versus LAI treatment in the same patients, might therefore better reflect the real-world impact of LAIs. A systematic literature search without language restriction was conducted using MEDLINE/PubMed, Cochrane Library, Web of Science, PsycINFO, and CINAHL until May 31, 2012. Search terms included synonyms of (1) antipsychotic(s) AND (2) schizophrenia and related disorders AND (3) depot, (long-acting) injection(s), microsphere, decanoate, palmitate, enanthate. Of 5,483 identified citations, 607 articles were fully inspected, and 582 were ineligible. Finally, 25 mirror-image studies from 28 countries that followed 5,940 patients with schizophrenia for ≥ 12 months (≥ 6 months each on oral antipsychotic and LAI treatment) met the inclusion criteria and were analyzed. Coprimary outcomes were hospitalization risk and number of hospitalizations. Secondary outcomes included hospitalization days and length of stay. LAIs showed strong superiority over oral antipsychotics in preventing hospitalization (16 studies, N = 4,066; risk ratio = 0.43; 95% CI, 0.35-0.53; P < .001) and in decreasing the number of hospitalizations (15 studies, 6,342 person-years; rate ratio = 0.38; 95% CI, 0.28-0.51; P < .001). This strong advantage was also observed for secondary outcomes and in multiple clinically relevant subpopulations and treatment groups. Results from mirror-image studies in patients eligible for clinical use of LAIs showed strong superiority of LAIs compared to oral antipsychotics in preventing hospitalization. The results were in contrast to the recent meta-analysis of RCTs, which showed no superiority of LAIs. Given the possible biases in mirror-image studies, such as expectation bias, natural illness course, and time effect, a cautious interpretation is required. Nevertheless, the population in mirror-image studies better reflects the population receiving LAIs in clinical practice.

While long-acting injectable antipsychotics (LAIs) are hoped to reduce high relapse rates in schizophrenia, recent randomized controlled trials (RCTs) challenged the benefits of LAIs over oral antipsychotics (OAPs). Systematic review/meta-analysis of RCTs that lasted ≥ 6 months comparing LAIs and OAPs. Primary outcome was study-defined relapse at the longest time point; secondary outcomes included relapse at 3, 6, 12, 18, and 24 months, all-cause discontinuation, discontinuation due to adverse events, drug inefficacy (ie, relapse + discontinuation due to inefficacy), hospitalization, and nonadherence. Across 21 RCTs (n = 5176), LAIs were similar to OAPs for relapse prevention at the longest time point (studies = 21, n = 4950, relative risk [RR] = 0.93, 95% confidence interval [CI]: 0.80-1.08, P = .35). The finding was confirmed restricting the analysis to outpatient studies lasting ≥ 1 year (studies = 12, RR = 0.93, 95% CI:0.71-1.07, P = .31). However, studies using first-generation antipsychotic (FGA)-LAIs (studies = 10, RR = 0.82, 95% CI:0.69-0.97, P = .02) and those published ≤ 1991 (consisting exclusively of all 8 fluphenazine-LAI studies; RR = 0.79, 95% CI: 0.65-0.96, P = 0.02) were superior to OAPs regarding the primary outcome. Pooled LAIs also did not separate from OAPs regarding any secondary outcomes. Again, studies using FGA-LAIs and those published ≤ 1991 were associated with LAI superiority over OAPs, eg, hospitalization and drug inefficacy. In RCTs, which are less representative of real-world patients than naturalistic studies, pooled LAIs did not reduce relapse compared with OAPs in schizophrenia patients. The exceptions were FGA-LAIs, mostly consisting of fluphenazine-LAI studies, which were all conducted through 1991. Because this finding is vulnerable to a cohort bias, studies comparing FGA-LAI vs second-generation antipsychotics-LAI and LAI vs OAP RCTs in real-world patients are needed.

Background: Ketamine and non-ketamineN-methyl-d-aspartate receptor antagonists (NMDAR antagonists) recently demonstrated antidepressant efficacy for the treatment of refractory depression, but effect sizes, trajectories and possible class effects are unclear.Method: We searched PubMed/PsycINFO/Web of Science/clinicaltrials.gov until 25 August 2015. Parallel-group or cross-over randomized controlled trials (RCTs) comparing single intravenous infusion of ketamine or a non-ketamine NMDAR antagonistv.placebo/pseudo-placebo in patients with major depressive disorder (MDD) and/or bipolar depression (BD) were included in the analyses. Hedges’gand risk ratios and their 95% confidence intervals (CIs) were calculated using a random-effects model. The primary outcome was depressive symptom change. Secondary outcomes included response, remission, all-cause discontinuation and adverse effects.Results: A total of 14 RCTs (nine ketamine studies:n= 234; five non-ketamine NMDAR antagonist studies:n= 354; MDD = 554, BD = 34), lasting 10.0 ± 8.8 days, were meta-analysed. Ketamine reduced depression significantly more than placebo/pseudo-placebo beginning at 40 min, peaking at day 1 (Hedges'g= −1.00, 95% CI −1.28 to −0.73,p< 0.001), and loosing superiority by days 10–12. Non-ketamine NMDAR antagonists were superior to placebo only on days 5–8 (Hedges'g= −0.37, 95% CI −0.66 to −0.09,p= 0.01). Compared with placebo/pseudo-placebo, ketamine led to significantly greater response (40 min to day 7) and remission (80 min to days 3–5). Non-ketamine NMDAR antagonists achieved greater response at day 2 and days 3–5. All-cause discontinuation was similar between ketamine (p= 0.34) or non-ketamine NMDAR antagonists (p= 0.94) and placebo. Although some adverse effects were more common with ketamine/NMDAR antagonists than placebo, these were transient and clinically insignificant.Conclusions: A single infusion of ketamine, but less so of non-ketamine NMDAR antagonists, has ultra-rapid efficacy for MDD and BD, lasting for up to 1 week. Development of easy-to-administer, repeatedly given NMDAR antagonists without risk of brain toxicity is of critical importance.