We investigated a rate of remission in stable Japanese outpatients.

It is defined as less than mild severity of key symptoms that would not affect behaviour and a successful maintenance of such stable status for more than six months.

Clinical stability was defined as fixed symptoms and absence of changes in main antipsychotics for at least six months.

There were 106 eligible patients with schizophrenia (DSM- IV); 50% were female, and mean age and duration of illness were 47 y.o. and 18 years, respectively, with an average of three prior admissions.

Thirty-six patients (34%) were in remission,

Remitted ambulatory patients were evaluated with the eight suggested symptoms in the Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale (PANSS) by the primary psychiatrists.
Additionally the Global Assessment of Functioning (GAF) was rated by the independent assessors who were unaware of the PANSS results. Remitted were above 61 GAF

.

Of 30 remitted patients all but three showed a GAF score of more than 61, while 67 of 70 non-remitted patients were with a GAF score of less than 60.
The cut-off score of 61 yielded sensitivity of 90% and specificity of 97% to define remission in our sample.
Average scores on the respective items among remitted patients ranged from 1.5 (hallucinatory behaviour) to 2.7 (blunted affect) and indicated a relative predominance of negative symptomatology.

Remission in schizophrenia, reportedly noted in about 22-46% of patients, could serve as a standardized outcome.