Simple schizophrenia: revisited.

Simple schizophrenia is no longer a part of official American classification schemes, but is a diagnosis still used in other parts of the world. Long considered a traditional schizophrenic subtype, in time the concept became unclear, was used infrequently, and exhibited poor reliability and doubtful descriptive validity. We reviewed charts of 52 patients diagnosed with simple schizophrenia. Our findings confirm the descriptive heterogeneity and diagnostic imprecision of simple schizophrenia.