Potential Role of Antipsychotic-Galantamine-Memantine Combination in the Treatment of Positive, Cognitive, and Negative Symptoms of Schizophrenia

The objective of this article is to critically dissect the published randomized cont rolled trials with galantamine and memantine for CIAS to highlight the efficacy signal. These studies may have failed to detect a clinically meaningful efficacy signal due to limitations, methodological issues, and possible medication nonadherence. There is evidence from a small open-label study tha t the galantamine-memantine combination may be effective for CIAS with kynurenine pathway metabolites as biomarkers to detect the severity of cognitive impairments. Given that there are no available treatments for cognitive impairments and primary negative symptoms in schizophrenia, testing of this “five-pronged strategy” (quintuple hypotheses: dopamine, nicotinic-cholinergic, glutamatergic/NMDA, GABA, and KYNA) is a “low-risk high-gain” approach that could be a major breakthrough in the field. The galantamine-memantine combination has the potential to treat positive, cognitive, and ne gative symptoms, and targeting the quintuple hypotheses concurrently may lead to a major scientific advancement – from antipsychotic treatment to antischizophrenia treatment.Mol Neuropsychiatry
Source: Molecular Neuropsychiatry - Category: Neuroscience Source Type: research