Comparison of the efficacy of Aripiprazole and Risperidone in improving the obsessive symptoms in bipolar disorder comorbid with obsessive-compulsive disorder

Obsessive-compulsive disorder can be associated with bipolar disorder at the same time. Studies show that the relatively high synchronization of these two disorders throughout the life span is about 9-39%. Bipolar disorder comorbid OCD is still not well studied. Treatment for obsessive-compulsive disorder is a significant clinical problem, because antidepressants are effective for obsessive-compulsive disorder may lead to the Accelerated of mania or hypomania and mixed phase. In this double blind clinical trial, 60 patients bipolar disorder comorbid obsessive-compulsive disorder were evaluated according to DSM5 criteria. Patients were chosen at least 3 months of maintenance therapy and Yale-Brown score of 16 or more. In one group, aripiprazole was started at a dose of 2.5 mg and was given at a dose of 10 mg per day over a period of 15 days. In the other group, it started with 1 mg of risperidone and was given at a dose of 4 mg per day. In the 4th, 8th and 12th weeks, patients with Yale-Brown scale were evaluated. The Yale-Brown mean score in the aripiprazole group was 23.3 before the study and 12.3 after 12 weeks. The Yale-Brown mean score in the risperidone was 25.5 before the study and changed to 11.27 after 12 months of treatment. Moreover, according to ANCOVA analysis model, it was indicated that at week 12 of treatment, the Yale-Brown scale in the risperidone group was 1.47 units lower than that of the aripiprazole, demonstrating a significant difference (P<.001). It was revealed that both drugs (aripiprazole and risperidone) were effective on treating the therapeutic-resistant obsessive-compulsive disorder comorbid with bipolar disorder in the maintenance phase. Furthermore, it was found a slight difference between the Yale-Brown mean scores of the two groups, which showed the advantage of risperidone over aripiprazole.