Drop drug distinction, doctors urged
Study concludes doctors should drop first and second generation antipsychotic drug distinction
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Friday, 05, Dec 2008 08:43
The distinction between first generation and second generation in antipsychotic drugs should be dropped, a study concludes.
Second-generation antipsychotic drugs were developed to be more effective and have less side effects – like weight gain – than the older, first generation drugs.
The older drugs are still used as a cheaper alternative as they are often generic.
However, a study in the Lancet has suggested doctors treating patients for conditions such as schizophrenia should bear in mind not all second generation drugs are better than their older counterparts.
Dr Stefan Leucht, clinic and polyclinic for psychiatry and psychotherapy at the Technische Universität München in Germany, and Dr John Davis, University of Illinois Chicago, USA and colleagues compared nine second-generation antipsychotic drugs with first-generation drugs for overall efficacy and side effects.
The authors concluded the first generation drugs differ so greatly from each other they do not form their own class – and this also applies to second generation drugs.
The authors said: "Improper generalisation creates confusion and as a result the classification might be abandoned.
"This meta-analysis provides data that clinicians could use for individualised treatment of patients with schizophrenia based on efficacy, side-effects, and cost of antipsychotic drugs."
Doctors should look at which drug is the best treatment for the illness – regardless of whether it is first or second generation, the authors concluded.
Professor Peter Tyrer, department of psychological medicine, Imperial College London, and Dr Tim Kendall of the National Collaborating Centre for Mental Health, Royal College of Psychiatrists' Research Unit, London, added: "The time has come to abandon the terms first-generation and second-generation antipsychotics, as they do not merit this distinction."