| Trial ID | NCT04871048 |
| Status | Recruiting |
| Condition | Schizophrenia |
| Intervention | Transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) active |
Cannabis use disorder affects up to 40% of patients with schizophrenia, yet standard addiction treatments show limited efficacy in this vulnerable population. This trial addresses a critical therapeutic gap where dual diagnosis patients often experience worsened psychotic symptoms and medication non-adherence.
This randomized controlled trial is recruiting 110 patients with schizophrenia and cannabis use disorder to receive 10 sessions of targeted transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS). The intervention applies anodal stimulation to the right dorsolateral prefrontal cortex and cathodal stimulation to the medial prefrontal cortex, targeting brain regions involved in executive control and reward processing. Primary endpoints include cannabis consumption reduction, with secondary measures of craving intensity, addiction severity, psychotic symptoms, and global functioning.
“If successful, this non-invasive neuromodulation approach could provide a much-needed adjunctive treatment for patients where traditional addiction therapies have fallen short. The targeted stimulation protocol represents a sophisticated understanding of the neurobiological overlap between addiction and psychotic disorders.”
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This trial item was assembled from normalized source metadata and pipeline scoring.
