Schizophrenia: From lab bench to clinical practice

Peter will talk about how our understanding of schizophrenia and its management has advanced over the last 20 years. Treatment advances include the introduction of early intervention teams, improved medication management and an increasing evidence base for talking treatments. Major challenges ahead include dealing with stigma, physical health inequalities and developing more effective treatments.

Jo will talk about her approach to mimicking human brain and behaviour disturbances in rats. Her research focus is cognition and negative symptoms in schizophrenia, two aspects of the illness not well managed with existing therapies. She will discuss her work, taking a naturalistic approach, involving food rewarded tasks where rats use olfactory cues to guide their behaviour. She is interested in testing new drugs and other approaches to treatment such as exercise therapy.

Lisa is here to tell you that exercise is good for you. Although you might not need a scientist to tell you that, the adage “what’s good for your heart is good for your brain” is demonstrably true. There is mounting evidence that exercise can be used to help a range of mental health issues, including schizophrenia, but we’re still not certain how. Introducing ‘rat gym’, where Lisa and colleagues hope that running wheels may lead to treatment revolutions.