Insight and cognitive complaints in stabilized outpatients with schizophrenia

TL;DR

This study explores how patients with schizophrenia who are aware of their condition also report more cognitive difficulties.

Contribution

The study reveals a strong link between clinical insight and subjective cognitive complaints in schizophrenia patients.

Findings

Better insight in schizophrenia is associated with higher subjective cognitive complaints across all domains.

Awareness of illness correlates with specific cognitive domains like working memory and attention.

Clinicians should consider insight when evaluating persistent cognitive complaints in patients.

Abstract

Schizophrenia is often considered as pathology of consciousness. Some authors have considered that patients’ self-perception of their cognitive difficulties expressed in the form of subjective complaints could represent a source of stress. These cognitive difficulties may then interfere with the interpretation of symptoms, leading to poor insight.

Insight and cognitive complaints in stabilized outpatients with schizophrenia.

Study the relationship between subjective cognitive complaints and clinical insight in a Tunisian population with schizophrenia.

This is a cross-sectional, descriptive and analytical study carried out on 72 stabilized patients followed at the post-cure psychiatry consultation ‘A’ at the CHU Hédi Chaker in Sfax diagnosed with schizophrenia according to the DSM 5 criteria.

We used the schedule for the Assessment of Insight–Expanded Version(SAI-E) scale to assess Clinical Insight and the Subjective Scale to Investigate Cognition in Schizophrenia (SSTICS) to determine subjective cognitive complaints

The mean age of the patients was 46.83 ± 11.6 years, with a sex ratio (M/F) of 2. In our study, 48.5% were single and 69.4% were unemployed.

The median total SSTICS score was 25.

Using the SAI-E scale, an average score of 20.1 was objectified in our study.

In our study, the better the insight, the greater the subjective cognitive complaints were in all cognitive domains (p=0.00).

Awareness of illness was statistically associated with working memory (p=0.001), explicit memory (p=0.004), attention (p=0.001), language (p=0.01) and executive functions (p=0.001).

Our study highlights the relationship between awareness of illness and cognitive complaints. The clinician, faced with repetitive cognitive complaints, should assess the insight before incriminating another cause (effects of a drug, cognitive deficit, etc.).

None Declared