Reading School of Pharmacy and the Pharmacy Department within Berkshire Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust are being funded by Janssen Pharmaceuticals to track the progress of some patients with schizophrenia. Schizophrenia is a long-term mental health condition that causes a range of symptoms including hallucinations, unusual beliefs, muddled thoughts and changes in behaviour. The researchers, Dr Parastou Donyai and Kate Masters, who are also pharmacists, and postdoctoral research fellow Dr Tamara Tompsett, will look at whether paliperidone palmitate long-acting injection improves patients’ wellbeing as well as their satisfaction with medication. They will work with colleagues based at Berkshire Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust and community-based practitioners to track patients’ progress for a period of 12 months. The study is important because it investigates the use of paliperidone palmitate outside of a formal clinical-trial setting, and links in with the latest measures that are being used by clinicians to gauge improvements in everyday situations. If these new ways of tracking progress in patients with schizophrenia prove useful then this study can impact on the way studies measure the value gained from medicines in the future.