Publication:

Gender difference in age at onset of schizophrenia among inpatients: a descriptive cross-sectional clinical study

Background Emil Kraepelin many years ago had observed that there is late age at onset in women for schizophrenia compared to men. This finding has been replicated in later several studies too. But there are no such studies conducted in Kerala to our best knowledge. Thus it is relevant to evaluate gender difference in age at onset of schizophrenia in a hospital-based population in Central Kerala.

Methods In this descriptive cross sectional clinical study conducted at Jubilee Mission Medical College and Research Institute, Thissur, all schizophrenia patients consecutively admitted with sample size of 100 (50 males and 50 females) and diagnosis confirmed as per mini international neuropsychiatric interview English Version 5.0.0 (M. I. N. I. PLUS) were included. Semi structured questionnaire was used to collect data. To test the significance, Mann-Whitney U test was applied and correlation was tested using Pearson’s correlation coefficient.

Results Our study results shows that mean age at onset of psychotic symptoms, mean age at first contact with a health care provider, mean age at index hospitalization in male patients was approximately 5 years earlier than that of female patients.

Conclusions Our study results shows a gender difference in age at onset of schizophrenia, with males having an earlier age at onset and lower average age of first admission than females.