Problems of schizo-affective disorders

The inclusion of schizo-affective type under schizophrenia in ICD-9 (9th revision of the international classification of diseases) and under psychotic disorders not elsewhere classified in DSM-3 (3rd edition of diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders), the absence of this term in the French classification, and its parallelism among Scandinavian writers with cycloid psychosis - all the above data reflect the present perplexity of schizo-affective disorders. Recent studies showed the presence of depressive symptoms in a large number of acute and chronic schizophrenias as an integral part of the schizophrenic process. The difficulty of differential diagnosis between mania and schizophrenia has added to our present dilemma. A review and discussion of the present status of the term 'schizo-affective disorders' are presented. A plea is made to abandon the dichotomy of functional psychosis with delineating 'psychosis of unknown etiology' into three or four categories (as this is no more functional).