Neuropsychological deficits in pediatric patients with childhood-onset schizophrenia and psychotic disorder not otherwise specified

Objective: Children with transient psychotic symptoms and serious emotional disturbances who do not meet current criteria for schizophrenia or other presently recognized diagnostic categories commonly present diagnostic and treatment problems. Clarifying the connections between children with narrowly defined schizophrenia and children with a more broadly defined phenotype (i.e., Psychotic Disorder Not Otherwise Specified, PD-NOS) has implications for understanding the pathophysiology of schizophrenia. In this study, the neuropsychological test performance of a subgroup of children with atypical psychosis was compared with that of patients with childhood-onset schizophrenia (COS). Method: Cognitive function was assessed with neuropsychological test battery regimens in 51 neuroleptic-nonresponsive patients within the first 2 weeks after admission while receiving stable medication. Only those patients who had an IQ>70 at NIMH testing (24 PD-NOS, 27 COS) were included in this analysis. Seventeen (39%) of 44 COS subjects were unavailable for this study as their IQ tested