34 THE COMBINATION OF ART CULTURE AND ARIPIPRAZOLE IN THE TREATMENT OF COGNITIVE FUNCTION IN PATIENTS WITH SCHIZOPHRENIA
Authors: Li Jing 
Published: February 2025

Abstract

Background
Schizophrenia is a common persistent mental disorder in clinical practice, characterized by abnormalities in perception, emotion, and behavior, with typical symptoms being chaotic thinking and emotional responses. At present, the causes of schizophrenia are not yet clear. But most scholars believe that the progression of schizophrenia is closely related to genetic and environmental factors. Schizophrenia may affect patients’ cognitive function, causing various harms to their physical and mental health and quality of life. Therefore, it is necessary to provide reasonable medication and psychological treatment to help patients with schizophrenia improve their condition. Aripiprazole is a common medication for treating schizophrenia, which can regulate emotions, improve cognitive function, and has minimal side effects. However, in actual clinical treatment, it has been found that the monotherapy effect of aripiprazole is not ideal. For this purpose, the study will analyze the clinical efficacy of art combined with aripiprazole in treating cognitive function in patients with schizophrenia.

Methods
The study selected 85 patients with schizophrenia admitted to a tertiary hospital in a certain city from 2020 to 2023 as the research subjects, and randomly divided them into an observation group (n=42) and a control group (n=43). The control group patients were treated with aripiprazole, while the observation group patients were treated with art works combined with aripiprazole. The medication method for aripiprazole is oral, with an initial dose of 10mg/d, and the dose is adjusted according to the actual development of the condition, with a maximum dose of 30mg/d. The experiment lasts for 2 months. Before and after treatment, the Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale (PANSS) was used to evaluate the severity of symptoms in patients, with higher scores indicating more severe symptoms. Use the Massachusetts General Hospital Cognitive and Physical Function Questionnaire (MGH-CPFQ) to rate patients’ cognitive function, with higher scores indicating poorer cognitive function.

Results
There was no significant difference in clinical basic data between the two groups of schizophrenia patients (P&gt;0.05), indicating comparability. The PANSS scores of both groups of patients significantly decreased before and after treatment (P&lt;0.05). After treatment, the positive symptom PANSS score of the observation group patients was 20.49 ± 4.22, and the negative symptom PANSS score was 12.54 ± 3.55, both significantly lower than the control group (P&lt;0.001). The MGH-CPFQ score of the observation group patients after treatment was 14.21 ± 2.23, significantly decreased from 29.34 ± 3.64 before treatment (P&lt;0.05). The MGH-CPFQ score of the control group patients after treatment was 19.33±2.71, significantly higher than that of the observation group (P&lt;0.05).

Discussion
Due to the prolonged condition of schizophrenia, patients require long-term oral medication intervention. The experimental results indicate that compared to monotherapy with aripiprazole, the combination therapy of artwork and aripiprazole can more effectively improve the negative symptoms, positive symptoms, and cognitive function of patients with schizophrenia, and enhance their quality of life. The research results can provide reference for the improvement of cognitive function in patients with schizophrenia.