[Variants of the stabilization process in the late stages of malignant schizophrenia]

Of 800 patients suffering from malignant schizophrenia for 20 years and longer a group of 94 patients showing signs of the process stabilization was selected. In a part of them (76 patients), residual positive disturbances (isolated, gradually subsiding hallucinatory manifestations not accompanied with any delusional interpretations) were noted. In the rest 18 patients, the clinical picture was characterized by personality changes according to the type of a monotonous activity or apathetic debility. Prolonged absence of positive disturbances and exacerbations in these patients suggests that the morbid process in them got stabilized (residual state). This type of the schizophrenia outcome is not an indispensable stage of the psychosis termination, and is observed rather infrequently-according to the author's data, in 2% of cases only.