Comparative Evaluation of Olanzapine with Aripiprazole versus Olanzapine with Amisulpiride in Schizophrenic Patients Partially Responding to Olanzapine Alone

Aims and Objective: schizophrenia is one of the most commonly encountered psychiatric disorders. Now a days mainstay of treatment of schizophrenia is by using atypical antipsychotics. No study have directly compared the efficacy & tolerability of combinations of atypical antipsychotics. Materials and Methods: Randomized , open label prospective parallel group observational study compared the efficacy & tolerability of olanzapine(10 mg) combination with aripiprazole(5‐ 10mg) versus olanzapine(10mg) with amisulpiride(100mg) in patient already treated with olanzapine alone & partially responded. 90 patient of either sex were randomized to receive standard doses of two combination of drugs orally for 8 week with follow up at every 4 week. Effectiveness was assessed by change in score of Positive Negative Symptom Scale (PANSS) total score from baseline & Clinical Global Impression score during treatment period. Results: Ninety patients were evaluated by dividing into two groups , 45 patients in each group. At week 8 , mean change in PANSS total score (olanzapine + aripiprazole ‐ 52 , olanzapine + amisulpiride ‐ 40 ) showed a treatment difference of 12 points , difference was statically significant (<0.05) .Olanzapine with aripiprazole proved to be superior to olanzapine with amisulpiride. . Olanzapine with ariprazole showed significant improvement in CGI‐I scale Conclusion: Both groups showed improvement in PANSS score & both groups are statistically significant. Olanzapine + aripiprazole had efficacy advantage over olanzapine + amisulpiride. Whereas amisulpiride was associated with significantly improvement in negative symptoms .