This article is part of the supplement: 1st International Congress on Neurobiology and Clinical Psychopharmacology and European Psychiatric Association Conference on Treatment Guidance

Open Access Meeting abstract

Treatment of psychotic symptoms in bipolar disorder with aripiprazole monotherapy: a meta-analysis

Konstantinos N Fountoulakis1*, Xenia Gonda2, Eduard Vieta3 and Frank Schmidt4

  • * Corresponding author: Konstantinos N Fountoulakis

Author Affiliations

1 3rd Department of Psychiatry, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece

2 Department of Pharmacology and Pharmacotherapy and Department of Psychiatry Kutvolgyi Klinikai Tömb, Semmelweis University, Budapest, Hungary

3 Bipolar Disorders Program, Hospital Clinic, University of Barcelona, IDIBAPS, CIBERSAM, Barcelona, Spain

4 Fethke Professor, Tippie College of Business, University of Iowa, USA

For all author emails, please log on.

Annals of General Psychiatry 2010, 9(Suppl 1):S225 doi:10.1186/1744-859X-9-S1-S225


The electronic version of this article is the complete one and can be found online at: http://www.annals-general-psychiatry.com/content/9/S1/S225


Published:22 April 2010

© 2009 Fountoulakis et al.; licensee BioMed Central Ltd.

Background

The current article is a systematic registration and meta-analysis of the available clinical trials concerning the usefulness of aripiprazole in the treatment of the psychotic symptoms in bipolar disorder.

Materials and methods

A systematic MEDLINE and repositories search concerning clinical trials for aripiprazole in bipolar disorder.

Results

The meta-analysis of 4 RCTs on acute mania suggests that the effect size of aripiprazole vs. placebo was equal to 0.14 but a more reliable and accurate estimation is 0.18 for the total PANSS score. The effect was higher for the PANSS positive subscale (0.28), PANSS hostility subscale (0.24) and PANSS cognitive subscale (0.20), and lower for the PANSS negative (0.12). No data on the depressive phase of bipolar illness exist, while there are some data in favour of aripiprazole concerning the maintenance phase, where at week 26 all except the total PANSS score showed a significant superiority of aripiprazole over placebo (d = 0.28 for positive, d = 0.38 for the cognitive and d = 0.71 for the hostility subscales) and at week 100 the results were similar (d = 0.42, 0.63 and 0.48 respectively).

Conclusions

The data analysed for the current study support the usefulness of aripiprazole against psychotic symptoms during the acute manic and maintenance phases of bipolar illness.