[pchivers]

This is a great article. The linked article ("Anti-Authoritarians and Schizophrenia: Do Rebels Who Defy Treatment Do Better?") is also very interesting:

"At the 2-year assessment there were no significant differences in severity of psychosis between schizophrenic patients (SZ) on antipsychotic medications and SZ not on any medications. However, starting at the 4.5-year follow-ups and continuing over the next 15 years, the SZ who were not on antipsychotic medications were significantly less psychotic than those on antipsychotics.”

[illuminate]

Sounds like persons who are less functional feel that they need medication more than those who don't. Not that anyone WANTS neuroleptics, the side effects sound terrible.

I would imagine that anyone who wants to deal through them is going to necessarily have more troubles.

[droithomme]

This is covered quite thoroughly in chapter 6 of Whitaker's Anatomy of an Epidemic, which has extensive citations of the history and research on this problem.

Neuroleptics make schizophrenia patients more biologically vulnerable to psychosis. Standard antipsychotics block 70-90% of D2 receptors in the brain. To compensate, postsynaptic neurons increase the density of their D2 receptors by 30% or more. The brain is then supersensitive to dopamine. This leads to dyskinetic and psychotic symptoms.