CASP3 and psychotic disorder: Caspase-3 is an important apoptosis-inducing molecule acting in final stages of this cell death program,15 which has been suggested to increase transiently around the onset of psychosis and later downregulate as an appropriate long-term compensatory response to earlier stress13 and may be due to second-generation antipsychotics, which seem to be more neuroprotective than the first generation by upregulating antiapoptotic proteins.44, 45