CORE 6: CHRONIC SCHIZOPHRENIA ASSESSMENT AND RECRUITMENT CORE The primary function of the Chronic Schizophrenia Recruitment and Assessment Core will be to recruit and clinically assess chronic schizophrenia patients and demographically comparable normal subjects for participation in projects of the Center for Neurocognition and Emotion in Schizophrenia. By centralizing the recruitment of chronic patients in a single Core, the aim is to increase the efficiency ofthe process and eliminate the need for individual projects to set up redundant recruitment mechanisms. To maximize the demographic similarity of the chronic sample to the other samples in the Center, chronic schizophrenia subjects will be recruited from former participants in prior longitudinal studies of first-episode patients conducted at the Aftercare Research Program who have had their onset of illness at least five years prior to enrollment in the Center research. This Core will screen, recruit, and conduct diagnostic interviews with the patient subjects and the normal comparison subjects. Staff from this Core will also complete ratings of symptom severity, functional capacity, functional outcome, and neurocognition for all subjects participating in this Core. In addition, this Core will facilitate and coordinate the involvement of these patient and normal subjects in Center projects, including the coordination of laboratory access at UCLA. Unlike the Prodromal Research Program and the Aftercare Research Program, no treatment is provided for these patients as part of their Center participation.
The specific aims ofthis Core are to: 1) recruit and evaluate patients with chronic schizophrenia from former participants ofthe UCLA Aftercare Program, 2) To conduct diagnostic, symptom, functional outcome, and neurocognitive assessments of Chronic patients who will be participating in Center project protocols, 3) To recruit, screen, and complete diagnostic, symptom, functional outcome, and neurocognitive assessments with demographically comparable normal comparison subjects, 4) To facilitate and coordinate the participation of chronic schizophrenia patients and demographically comparable normal subjects in the Center projects.
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