The genetics of drug tolerance

(Medical Xpress)—Put yourself in the shoes of a psychiatrist. You just diagnosed a person with schizophrenia, and you can prescribe any number of antipsychotic drugs, all of which can cause serious side effects. You know that older drugs, such as haloperidol, work well, but a third of all schizophrenia patients who take it suffer from Parkinsonian-like symptoms, such as tremors, involuntary spasms, and uncontrollable facial movements. You also know that those side effects are permanent in about half the people who experience them. In other words, you could be prescribed a drug that causes permanent brain damage.