The efficacy of cognitive neurorehabilitation with RehaCom program in schizophrenia patients

Schizophrenic patients present cognitive dysfunctions which are currently regarded to be one of endophenotypical markers predisposing to schizophrenia. This indicates neurostructural changes underlying schizophrenia, which can be treated as a neurodegenerative and neurodeveloping disease. Aim. The purpose of this study was to assess the possibility of neuropsychological rehabilitation in schizophrenia. Methods. 41 participants and 40 control subjects were randomly selected and did not show differences in gender, age and illness duration. Both groups had the diagnosis of paranoid schizophrenia according to ICD-10 criteria and were treated with antipsychotic drugs. Cognitive functions were checked with Wisconsin Card Sorting Test (WCST), Trail Making Test (TMT), and Stroop Color-Word Interference Test (SCWT) in the beginning and in the end of the experiment. In the research group each patient was trained with the rehabilitation programs that focused on attention and concentration and topological memory. This group was compared with the control group that was not trained with RehaCom. Results. RehaCom procedures apparently can be useful in neuropsychological rehabilitation of cognitive dysfunctions in patients with diagnosed schizophrenia. Every participant from the research group showed a significant improvement in the training programs, especially in attention/concentration procedure. The analysis of parameters obtained in the neuropsychological tests showed some improvement in neuropsychological assessment in both groups. Conclusions. Cognitive rehabilitation produces moderate improvement in cognitive functioning. A comprehensive treatment using also new technologies supporting pharmacological treatments and other therapies should result in increased cognitive functioning and as a consequence improvement of quality of patient's life.