Publication at First Faculty of Medicine |
2008
Abstract
Psychiatrists should provide regular physical health monitoring because in most cases they are the only physicians visited by the psychotic patients. There is a clinical need to monitor antipsychotic-treated patients for metabolit, cardiovascular, neurological and andocrine disturbance and to develop collaborations with primary care physicians, diabetes specialists, and cardiologists to facilitate appropriate medical care for these patients.
Antipsychotic-treated patients should also receive regular visual examinations. The monitoring of physical health of patients with schizophrenia increases safety and tolerability of antipsychotics treatment and decreases morbidity and mortality.