Two-year study of relapse prevention by a new education program in schizophrenic patients treated with the same antipsychotic drug

It is not clear whether patient's psycho-education enhances compliance to antipsychotic treatments and reduces the number of relapses. Here we investigated the impact of a new psycho-educational program (SOLEDUC®) on the one- and two-years rate of relapse (primary outcome measure) and a number of clinical assessments (secondary outcome measures). This was a multicentric French clinical trial (51 centers) of Phase IV, open, controlled, randomized, consisting in two parallel groups: the Soleduc group (N = 111) and the control group (N = 109). All subjects received a variable dose over the 2-year period of the same antipsychotic drug (amisulpride). Soleduc consisted of a 7-session program (1 h per session), presented three times (at baseline, 6-months and 12-months). Patients in the control group received a non-specific psychosocial training for an equivalent period of time. The models of Andersen-Gill (AG) and Prentice, Williams and Peterson (PWP) were used to analyze relapses. Patients in the Soleduc group attended 14.8 ± 6.1 sessions (mean ± SD), including 17 patients who never attended a session. Intent to treat analysis showed less patients relapsing in the Soleduc group as compared to the control group (21.6% versus 28.4% after 1 year and 84.4% versus 90.8% after 2 years), but the differences were not statistically significant. Relapse risk was significantly reduced for patients who followed at least 7 modules (p = 0.015 AG-test; p < 0.001 PWP-test). In conclusion, no significant differences in relapse rates were found between patients attending the Soleduc program and the control group. Attendance of at least 7 out of 21 program sessions was required to see a modest, but significant two-year relapse prevention in schizophrenia. Other well designed studies are required to evaluate the medical impact of patient's education programs.