Nontraditional or alternative treatments cover a wide range of therapies, techniques, and healing philosophies. They are effective for some conditions, but nobody has shown they can relieve the symptoms of schizophrenia. However, some alternative and complementary treatments might provide positive ancillary or side benefits.

One example is stress reduction. Stress is known to trigger problems in people with schizophrenia. Yoga, massage, meditation, and acupuncture may have some positive physical and/or psychological effects, but they do not treat the core symptoms of serious diseases. Anything that can effectively counter the effects of stress, however, may have health benefits for consumers of mental health care. Many alternative treatments may have calming effects on people, although this is difficult to measure. As long as such treatments do no harm and are not used as replacements for proven therapies, there is no reason to avoid them.

Help from the Plant World

Some plants and plant extracts can affect the body in good ways and bad, but none have been shown to be as effective against schizophrenia as antipsychotic drugs. In addition, some herbal supplements may interact with conventional drugs. This is an active area of research partly because of the appeal of natural products. Scientists should learn more about these interactions in coming years.

Homeopathy, naturopathy, shamanism, therapeutic touch, and Ayurveda are other alternative therapies that have not been proven to be effective in treating schizophrenia. Finally, insurance companies will not pay for most alternative therapies.

Some alternative treatments may provide a placebo effect. That is, if they make a person feel better psychologically and produce no harm, there might be no reason to avoid them. Any form of treatment, however, that involves the administration of plants, herbs, chemicals, or other substances should be considered very carefully before use by a person with a mental disorder.

Generally, scientists and medical experts agree that patients with psychiatric disorders should not rely on alternative treatments in place of established psychiatric therapies. If they don't interfere with standard treatments and don't harm patients, some might be useful as adjunctive therapy if they safely raise morale.

Useful Lessons from Alternative Approaches

Nontraditional therapies may not be proven to be effective against mental disorders, but many offer a holistic approach. This means they attempt to consider all aspects of a person's life; not just the physical and the mental, but the emotional and spiritual as well. Modern biological psychiatry has its hands full treating the worst symptoms of schizophrenia. Therapists, relatives, religious advisers, and other counselors can contribute a great deal to a patient's sense of well-being by addressing concerns many physicians can't.

The Proof Is in the Study

The only way to tell if a proposed nontraditional treatment is effective is to treat one group of patients with it and see how well they do compared to a group that does not receive the same treatment. The first group is called the experimental group and the second is called the control group.

No matter how often you hear that someone knows someone who benefited from an alternative treatment, this hearsay does not constitute scientific proof. Even if you watched it happen to someone close to you, it would be necessary to rule out other factors that might have influenced or even explained the effect you witnessed before you could claim that the alternative treatment worked. Without a controlled test, it is merely an anecdote.

If you are making treatment decisions affecting someone you care about, learn to ask this question when you hear a claim that something works: Is this an anecdote or is it scientifically proven? It often seems as if anecdotes that contradict standard practice receive more publicity than do anecdotes confirming standard practice.

There are plenty of physicians and scientists who would like nothing more than to find a better treatment for schizophrenia. These researchers would leap at the opportunity to identify something that could aid recovery from this serious brain disease. So far only the typical and atypical antipsychotic drugs have passed that test.

It is not difficult to design a study of a new treatment, but there are potential complications. One important factor is the length of time patients will receive the experimental treatment and the control treatment. It often takes time to see the effects of medications. A short-lasting experiment might not show any results only because they never had a chance to become apparent. Conducting a longer study raises the question of how fairly one is treating the patients who receive only the placebo, that is, no treatment at all.

Testing a New Treatment

On paper, it is possible to design a study that compares an experimental group receiving a nontraditional treatment and a control group receiving only a placebo. In reality, such a simple design might not be approved by an ethical review board that must approve all studies or experiments involving humans or animals.

It might not be approved because schizophrenia is such a serious disease. It is unethical not to treat patients for an extended period if even partially effective treatments are available. Not treating the control group at all would knowingly endanger their health. Since it is also possible that the nontraditional treatment might be ineffective, the experimental group might also be entitled to receive current, standard antipsychotic treatment instead of facing months without proven effective treatment. Thus, the actual experimental design of a long-term study might involve an experimental group receiving anti-psychotic medications and nontraditional treatment compared to controls receiving antipsychotic medications and a placebo. It can get complicated, but it is doable and is done in tests of potential new treatments every year.