Sanjai Rao, MD: Long-Acting Injectables for Schizophrenia

Treatment adherence is a major concern in psychiatry, particularly for patients with schizophrenia.

Oral medications administered at home by the patient can often be forgotten or ignored because of various concerns.

However, a recent push to develop long-acting injectables for schizophrenia has put some accountability in place, while also improving care for patients.

In an interview with HCPLive® during the 2022 Annual Psychiatric Times™ World CME Conference in San Diego, Sanjai Rao, MD, Professor of Psychiatry, University of California, San Diego, explained how valueable long-acting injectables are for this patient population.

“The basic premise is we’ve known for a long time that patients with schizophrenia have a lot of difficulty taking their medication. This is not unique to schizophrenia,” he said. “If you look at any chronic illness or mental health illness, medication adherence rates are very low. It’s just the nature of things.”

Rao presented a talk about this subject during the conference and said the more infrequent dosing that must be conducted in a health care setting will take a lot of the forgetfulness of human being out of the equation.

Currently drugs are being developed that can be taken anywhere from monthly and twice a year.