The aim of the paper was to evaluate rates of clinical remission and recovery according to gender in a cohort of chronic outpatients attending a university community mental health center who had been diagnosed with schizophrenia and schizoaffective disorder according to DSM-IV-TR. A sample of 100 consecutive outpatients (70 males and 30 females) underwent comprehensive psychiatric evaluation using the Structured Clinical Interview for Diagnosis of Axis I and II DSM-IV (SCID-I and SCID-II, Version R) and an assessment of psychopathology, social functioning, clinical severity, subjective wellbeing, and quality of life, respectively by means of PANSS (Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale), PSP (Personal and Social Performance), CGI-SCH (Clinical Global Impression—Schizophrenia scale), SWN-S (Subjective Well-being under Neuroleptics—scale), and WHOQOL (WHO Quality of Life). Rates of clinical remission and recovery according to different criteria were calculated by gender. Higher rates of clinical remission and recovery were generally observed in females than males, a result consistent with literature data. Overall findings from the paper support the hypothesis of a better outcome of the disorders in women, even in the very long term. 1. Introduction The importance of gender differences in psychiatry is widely acknowledged, given its relevance for a better understanding of biological and psychosocial risk factors, time course, outcome, and response to treatments of major mental disorders, in particular schizophrenia and psychotic spectrum disorders [1–4]. Moreover, gender differences may play a crucial role in the early diagnosis and treatment of schizophrenia [5–7]. Indeed, a significant body of data revealed gender differences in terms of incidence rates, neurobiological factors, familial transmission, age of onset, clinical features, course and outcome, treatment response, compliance, and tolerability of drug treatments [2, 3, 8, 9]. According to the majority of authors, males manifest the disease earlier [2, 10, 11] and display more severe premorbid dysfunctions, intellectual impairment, and social deficits [10, 12–15], although data present in the literature are somewhat conflicting at times [5]. However, course and outcome of the illness [2, 10, 16], as well as the first episode of psychosis itself, are usually more severe and disabling in males [17–19]. On the contrary, women manifest onset symptoms later in life [2, 10, 11, 17], complete their studies, get married, or establish intimate relationships more frequently than males, showing less
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