It is dismaying that well into the 21st century schizophrenia
remains a highly prevalent, devastating and
poorly understood disease for which the only accepted
therapy is non-specific antipsychotic and
anti-seizure medication. Fresh approaches, even unconventional
ones, should be welcomed for study by
the psychiatric community if they are biologically
plausible and non-toxic. This article summarizes the
evidence that certain vitamin deficiencies can
worsen the symptoms of schizophrenia, and the evidence
that large doses of certain vitamins could improve
the core metabolic abnormalities that
predispose some people to develop it; it recounts the
history of a controversial vitamin-based therapy for
schizophrenia called orthomolecular psychiatry;
and it concludes by advocating a process for discovering
promising new schizophrenia therapies that
involves small, carefully conducted clinical trials of
nutrient combinations in appropriately selected patients.