Timing is everything

Beginning in the 1970s, some hospitalized patients with schizophrenia began receiving drug injections that lasted for weeks in place of their daily antipsychotic pills. These extended doses helped them stick to their prescribed course of medicine but also carried the risk of causing irreversible neurological damage. Roxanne Khamsi reports on how newer versions of such long-acting injectables might radically change the treatment of ailments ranging from alcoholism to diabetes.