The meta- analysis, conducted by John M. Davis, MD and Philip G. Janicak, MD of the University of Illinois, is published in the February issue of Psychiatric Annals. Some individual studies of risperidone are not statistically significant, but when data from all the studies are compiled and risperidone is compared to standard antipsychotic agents under the best and worst-case scenarios, it is clear that risperidone is substantially more effective and affects a wider variety of symptoms than conventional drugs.
Conventional antipsychotics block primarily dopamine receptors.
The meta-analysis explores whether risperidone 's additional 5HT2 blockade and targeted mechanism of action produces greater efficacy, a wider spectrum of efficacy, and an improved safety profile than standard antipsychotics. The improvement in positive symptoms may result in fewer hospital readmissions and its relative freedom from adverse effects means a reduction in the cost of managing patients' therapy. Such savings could far outweigh the initial cost of this medication. The results of the five trials were combined and evaluated using two different meta-analytic techniques to explore the efficacy of risperidone compared to standard neuroleptics. Please contact us with any comments, problems or bugs.