NEW YORK -- A new study financed by the U.S. government sheds new light on the system that promotes and approves new drugs, and shows the need for strict- er guidelines to better protect consumers and reduce unnecessary government spending.
The study, sponsored by the National Institute of Mental Health, compared four new-generation drugs, and one older drug, used to treat schizophrenia, a mental disorder that affects more than 3 million people in the United States. It involved an 18-month clinical trial involving 1,400 adults from around the nation.
The trial, called the Clinical Antipsychotic Trials of Intervention Effectiveness, or CATIE, measured how long patients continued to take their assigned drugs before they switched because of the feeling that their drug wasn't working or was causing serious side effects.
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