I’m going to give information here that gives hope for those of us living with a diagnosis of SZ and our family members:

Clinical remission is possible without having to wait years and years or decades to to achieve it.

The criteria for remission is at least six months of mild, minimal, or absent symptoms. According to the Remission in Schizophrenia Working Group you can achieve remission in as little as six months.

! want to list the criteria for remission from schizophrenia according to the Remission in Schizophrenia Working Group:

“Criteria include a score of 3 (mild), 2 (minimal), or 1 (absent) for at least six months for all of the following items on the Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale (PANSS)*:”

1. Delusions (P1)
2. Conceptual disorganization (P2)
3. Hallucinatory behavior (P3)
4. Unusual thought content (G9)
5. Mannerisms and posturing (G5)
6. Blunted Affect (N1)
7. Passive/apathetic social withdrawal (N4)
8. Lack of spontaneity and flow of conversation (N6)

*A score of <3 suggests a level at which symptomatology does not have appreciable affects on daily functioning.

The stages of remission go from acute phase to stabilization phase to stable phase to remission.

Elsewhere it’s been indicated that upwards of 85 percent of individuals diagnosed with SZ reach the stable, stabilization, and recovery phases of the illness.

Fifteen percent have a refractory or treatment-resistant version.

“The journey to recovery can start at any time point throughout the stages of illness to achieving remission.”

This criteria is taken from “Striving Towards Recovery: Setting New Expectations in Schizophrenia”–a poster session that Ronald Diamond, MD presented at the NAMI convention in Washington DC in 2006.

Other research indicates that you can be in remission without achieving a better level of functional recovery. And that clinical remission in one study predicted functional improvement.

The bottom line: you can have a full and robust life living in recovery regardless of whether or not you’re in remission.

I offer this six-month guideline to give blog readers living with SZ and family members of loved ones with SZ hope that remission is not impossible to achieve.

Recovery is not impossible to achieve either.

It’s a mistake to set the hoops higher and higher that people diagnosed with SZ have to go through to be considered to be recovered.

So-called normal people have gotten a free pass at being jackasses and no one insists they live up to the impossible demands that people with SZ are expected to adhere to.

The criteria for remission is six months according to the Remission in Schizophrenia Working Group. Understand?