Table 1

Inclusion and exclusion criteria for the study

Inclusion criteriaExclusion criteria
1. Patients with age between 18 and 45 years with a diagnosis of schizophrenia according to DSM-V criteria.
2. Duration of disease <15 years.
3. Meet criteria for TRS.*
4. Used to ICT tools and physical capability to use them.
5. Presence (and willingness to participate) of a caregiver or informal carer.
1. Meet criteria for remission according to the Remission of Schizophrenia Working Group.23
2. Presence of delusions mainly related with their therapists or with new technologies.
3. To have hearing, vision or motor impairment that makes impossible to operate a smartphone.
4. The caregiver or informal carer is not used to ICT tools or has physical incapability to use them.
5. Presence of intellectual developmental disability.
  • Some patients may be considered pseudo-resistant to treatment.22 In this case, presence of active symptoms may be influenced by psychiatric and medical conditions such as social isolation, consumption of toxic substances, presence of nutritional and medical problems, inappropriate health habits which may substantially contribute to poor responses or insufficient effects of medication. Data regarding these conditions will be collected.

  • Patients  having at least two failed adequate trials with different antipsychotics (at chlorpromazine-equivalent doses of ≥600  mg/day  for ≥6  consecutive  weeks) as well as scores of  ≥4 on the Clinical Global Impression-Severity (CGI-SCH) and ≤50  on the  Global Assessment of Functioning (GAF) scales OR patients  with clozapine ongoing treatment due to meeting treatment-resistant criteria as well as scores of  ≥4  on the CGI-SCH and  ≤50 on the GAF scale.

  • *Operational definition of treatment-resistant schizophrenia, modified from Suzuki and colleagues.21

  • DSM-V, Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders; ICT, information and communications technology; TRS, treatment-resistant schizophrenia.