Schizophrenia is a chronic disease characterized by disturbances of thought, perception, volition, affectivity and cognition. An imbalance of the oxidant-antioxidant system is one of the proposed etiological factors. There are controversies regarding the effect of antipsychotics on the oxidant-antioxidant balance.

The aim of this research is to study the serum levels of the total antioxidant capacity (TAC) in paranoid schizophrenia patients treated with typical and/or atypical antipsychotics.

The sample is comprised by 38 patients admitted to the psychiatric ward of the University Hospital of the Canary Islands. All patients met DSM-IV criteria for paranoid schizophrenia. Some patients were treated only with atypical antipsychotics (N=21) while others were treated with a combination of atypical and typical antipsychotics (N=17).

The next table shows the comparison of serum TAC levels at admission (TAC-A) and discharge (TAC-D) at 12:00 and 00:00 h.

Patients treated with a combination of typical and atypical antipsychotics present at discharge (12:00 hours) significantly higher levels of TAC than patients treated only with typical antipsychotics. The remaining comparisons did not elicit significant results.

The results point out the fact that a combination of typical and atypical antipsychotics is more helpful in reducing the deficits of the antioxidant system than treatments based only on typical antipsychotics.