Antipsychotic

Antipsychotics (also known as neuroleptics or major tranquilizers) are a class of psychiatric medication primarily used to manage psychosis (including delusions, hallucinations, or disordered thought), in particular in schizophrenia and bipolar disorder]]. The word neuroleptic originates from the Greek word "νεῦρον", neuron ("nerve") and lepsis ("seizure" or "fit").

First-generation antipsychotics, known as typical antipsychotics, were discovered in the 1950s. Most second-generation drugs, known as atypical antipsychotics, have been developed more recently, although the first atypical antipsychotic, clozapine, was discovered in the 1950s and introduced clinically in the 1970s. Both generations of medication tend to block receptors in the brain's dopamine pathways, but atypicals tend to act on serotonin receptors as well.

Notable and relatively common adverse effects of antipsychotics include extrapyramidal symptoms (which involve motor control) and hyperprolactinaemia primarily in typicals and weight gain and metabolic abnormalities mostly in atypicals.