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Hepatitis C in Schizophrenia: Screening Experience in a Community-Dwelling Clozapine Cohort

Received September 2, 2005; revised May 26, 2006; accepted June 13, 2006. From the Massachusetts General Hospital Schizophrenia Program, the Division of Infectious Diseases and Partners AIDS Research Center; the Division of Psychiatry and Medicine, and Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA. Send correspondence and reprint requests to Oliver Freudenreich, M.D., MGH Schizophrenia Program, Freedom Trail Clinic, 25 Staniford St., Second Floor, Boston, MA 02114. e-mail: ofreudenreich{at}partners.org
© 2007 The Academy of Psychosomatic Medicine

Hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection occurs in up to 20% of patients with chronic mental illnesses. To determine the prevalence of hepatitis C in a diagnostically well-defined sample, the authors screened all schizophrenia outpatients in a clozapine clinic (N=98) for HCV antibodies. Eight patients were positive for hepatitis C antibodies (antibody-positive prevalence: 8.2%); of those, 50% had detectable viral loads (viremia-positive prevalence: 4.1%). Screening for HCV infection should be considered for outpatients with schizophrenia. However, clinical experience treating HCV in schizophrenia patients is limited; in this cohort, 2 years after screening, no patient had received interferon/ribavirin treatment.

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