Imperial College Health Partners (ICHP)

ID 420

This project aims to understand the characteristics of patients with SCZ, their interactions with health- and social care, and whether cognitive function/impairment is assessed.

Schizophrenia (SCZ) is thought to be one of the most serious psychiatric illnesses affecting ~24 million people worldwide and 500,000 in the UK. Symptoms of SCZ are usually classified into two types: ‘positive’ symptoms – any change in behaviour or thoughts (e.g. believing, seeing, hearing, smelling or feeling things that do not exist outside their mind), and ‘negative’ symptoms – withdrawal from usual social interactions (e.g. no interest in everyday social interactions, appearing emotionless and flat). However, it is increasingly recognised that a third type of symptom, cognitive impairment (difficulty with memory or concentration), is also a feature of SCZ. This project aims to understand the characteristics of patients with SCZ, their interactions with health- and social care, and whether cognitive function/impairment is assessed. This is important as schizophrenic patients with cognitive impairment can experience difficulties with managing their health (e.g. keeping track of doctor’s appointments or medication) and activities of daily living (e.g. struggling to cook). Identifying these characteristics would help doctors to target patients who may benefit from interventions to improve or slow deterioration in cognitive function. This project will benefit the patients of NWL with SCZ and cognitive impairment by capturing the burden in terms of service use and engagement with health and social services and understand how this can be reduced through improved management of the disease.

15/08/2024

TRE