Abstract
Introduction:
Several studies have examined whether ethnicity as an independent factor can influence
the individual’s dosage of antipsychotics. However, there has been inconsistency in
the results of these studies, particularly between white and non-white populations.
This retrospective study tests the hypothesis of different dosing of antipsychotics
in white Europeans vs. non-white Europeans considering both the self-reported ethnicity
and the geographical ancestry calculated using 196 DNA markers.
Methods:
We collected self-reported ethnicity and DNA samples from 209 schizophrenia patients.
We tested the association between self-reported and genetically-determined ethnicity
with the chlorpromazine equivalent dose of each antipsychotic prescribed at the time
of the assessment.
Results:
We did not find any significant difference between self-reported white European ethnicity
and chlorpromazine equivalent doses (p=0.972). Furthermore, when we considered the
geographical ancestry determined by the 196 SNPs, we could not find any correlation
between the European ancestry and chlorpromazine equivalent dose.
Discussion:
Our preliminary analysis shows that there is no evidence that different ethnic groups
receive different dose of antipsychotics.
Key words
schizophrenia - antipsychotics - ethnicity - chlorpromazine equivalent - structure
analysis
