Badii Amamou*, Nesrine Essid, Amel Mrad, Ahmed Mhalla and Lotfi Gaha
Tardive dyskinesia is an extrapyramidal side effect that can occur after a prolonged use of antipsychotic medication, it appears to be about 0.4% to 4% worldwide. Prior reports suggest that clozapine may be effective in the management of tardive dyskinesia. We present the case of a patient with tardive dyskinesia induced by antipsychotics. After treatment failure with other psychotropic medications, clozapine medication was initiated; we used the "evaluation of tardive dyskinesia" scale to assess severity of tardive dyskinesia. We noticed a significant improvement in tardive dyskinesia from the fifth week of treatment with clozapine at the dose of 250 mg per day with a decrease in the scale score for "evaluation of tardive dyskinesia" from 70 to 22. Clozapine appears to be efficacious in the management of tardive dykinesia. Larger, randomized, blinded, and controlled prospective studies are needed to confirm these findings and to determine optimal dosage.
