System of psychotherapy for patients with schizotypal disorder

Background. A review of the specialized literature gives an idea of the dissociation between the significant prevalence of polymorphic forms of schizotypal disorder and the lack of scientific development of psychotherapy methods for these conditions. Purpose. To develop and test the effectiveness of the system of psychotherapy of affective disorders in patients with schizotypal disorder. Materials and Methods. According to the results of preliminary clinical anamnestic, clinical, psychopathological and psychodiagnostic studies of a contingent of 100 patients with schizotypal disorder with affective disorders of various spectrums, a system of psychotherapy for the phenomena under study was developed. To evaluate the effectiveness of the developed therapeutic measures, we used SF-36 questionnaire for determining quality of life indicators. Results. The developed system of psychotherapy is implemented in two consecutive stages: the first one is aimed at affective manifestations directly, and the second one is aimed at the second stage is aimed at developing patients’ skills of perception of subjective signs of deterioration of the underlying disease. According to the results of the analysis, it was found that patients who received psychotherapeutic treatment within the developed system had significantly (p≤0.001) higher quality of life scores 3 months after the treatment treatment compared to patients who did not receive such support: the total score was 63.83±0.35 and 60.98±0.39 points, respectively. Significant differences were found between the study groups in such components of quality of life as «Life activity», «Social activity», «Social functioning» and «Mental health». Conclusions. A two-stage system of psychotherapy of affective disorders has been developed in patients with schizotypal disorder, based on the principles of personalized medicine, the first stage of which is aimed at the direct reduction of affective disorders, the second – on the acquisition of new skills of self-analysis and detection of indirect signs of deterioration of their condition, which, in combination with adequate psychopharmacologic support allowed to improve their quality of life.