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Query: UMLS:C0036572 (seizures)
 80,221 document(s) hit in 31,850,051 MEDLINE articles (0.00 seconds)

The relationship of concurrent benzodiazepine administration to seizure duration in ECT was examined. Administration of a standard oral dose of 10 mg diazepam to a series of patients suffering from major depressive disorder produced a significant reduction in men seizure length during ECT compared to length of ECT-induced seizure in those patients when they were benzodiazepine free. This finding is discussed.
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PMID:The relationship of concurrent benzodiazepine administration to seizure duration in ECT. 398 67

The number of electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) stimulations over a course of treatment that resulted in brief or no seizure activity was evaluated for depressed patients (N = 58, treated for DSM-III diagnosed major depressive disorder) who had been randomly assigned to either bilateral or unilateral nondominant ECT in a double-blind study. Comparable treatment efficacy between both groups was found. Although there were no group differences in brief seizures, unilateral nondominant ECT resulted in more missed seizures (p less than 0.01) and required more restimulations than bilateral ECT. Of 27 unilateral ECT patients, 63% had at least one missed seizure over the course of treatment, compared to 29% of 31 bilateral ECT patients (p less than 0.02). Although more missed seizures occurred early in treatment, brief seizures occurred later in treatment. As missed seizures are not always detected clinically, it is possible that without seizure monitoring, patients with unilateral nondominant ECT will not improve at the same rate as patients with bilateral ECT. Lack of seizure monitoring in the clinic is one likely explanation for the discrepancy between a number of research studies reporting equivalent efficacy for bilateral and unilateral ECT and the clinical impression that bilateral ECT is more effective.
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PMID:Missed and brief seizures during ECT: differential response between unilateral and bilateral electrode placement. 398 58

Abuse of amphetamine and especially the stimulant look-alikes represent a serious problem in the United States. The danger of amphetamine lies in its ability to produce tolerance, psychological addiction, psychosis, hypertensive crisis, and major depression following withdrawal after long-term use. The danger of the look-alikes is of a psychosocial nature and has less to do with the physical properties of the drugs. Easy availability and a casual attitude toward these drugs may introduce children and young adults to the concept of recreational use of drugs at an early age. Look-alikes also divert the efforts of law enforcement officials whose time is better spent on efforts to control illegal distribution of controlled substances. However, look-alikes do produce severe to life-threatening effects including seizures, hypertensive crises, and psychoses. Unfortunately, there are no fast and easy solutions to the stimulant drug abuse problem. Abuse of CNS stimulants has a long history. Effective approaches must involve greater education about the dangers of these drugs and improved recognition among medical professionals of trends in CNS stimulant abuse in order to better diagnose and treat resulting problems. It is unlikely that federal controls on amphetamine production can be increased. The OTC drugs, such as PPA, caffeine, and ephedrine could be moved to prescription-only status to emphasize their potential for abuse and for producing adverse reactions, but this approach is counter to society's current trend toward self-medication.
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PMID:CNS stimulants and the look-alike drugs. 615 45

We have studied prospectively 39 patients receiving a course of electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) for major depressive disorder; they were allocated randomly to receive either propofol or methohexitone for anaesthesia. Recovery after the third ECT treatment was assessed by finger tap and digit symbol substitution tests at 15, 30, 45, 60 and 90 min after induction. Seizure duration (median (interquartile range)) was shorter with propofol (24 (10) s) than methohexitone (29 (17) s) (P = 0.08). There was no significant difference in psychometric recovery for drug type, duration of the seizure or initial severity of depression. These results suggest that the more rapid recovery rates noted with propofol in other procedures are not evident after electrically induced seizures.
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PMID:Recovery after electroconvulsive therapy: comparison of propofol with methohexitone anaesthesia. 754 47

Fifteen inpatients (nine women, six men) aged 50-86 years with DSM-IIIR major depression were treated with electroconvulsive therapy (ECT). Electrode placement (unilateral versus bilateral) and total number of treatments were determined by the patients' own psychiatrists according to clinical indications. Prolactin (PRL) was determined after the 1st, 6th, 7th, 9th, 11th, and final ECT treatments. Subjects were rated with the Hamilton Depression Rating Scale (HDRS) at baseline, after the sixth ECT treatment, and upon completion of ECT. PRL response to unilateral ECT was consistent across treatment for each subject. Percentage PRL increase was significantly higher for bilateral than unilateral ECT (alpha = 0.05). Subjects with final HDRS of < 12 tended to have greater peak, increase, and percentage increase PRL at the first unilateral treatment than subjects with final HDRS of at least 12; these trends approached statistical significance (Kruskal-Wallis one-way analysis of variance; peak: p = 0.059, chi = 3.556, df = 1; increase: p = 0.099, chi = 2.722, df = 1; percentage increase: p = 0.099, chi = 2.722, df = 1). Decrease in HDRS after the sixth treatment failed to show a statistically significant relationship to any PRL parameter at the initial unilateral treatment. Further studies are needed to characterize the relationship between PRL response, seizure activity, and stimulus dosing.
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PMID:Prolactin release and clinical response to electroconvulsive therapy in depressed geriatric inpatients: a preliminary report. 779 64

There are no published data on the effects of seizures on indices of gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA) function in human subjects. In study 1, the effects of electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) on free plasma GABA were studied in 39 inpatients with major depressive disorder. Acutely after ECT, free plasma GABA was significantly reduced for up to 1 h after seizure termination, and this finding replicated strongly in a subgroup of six patients who received a second course of ECT. In a second study at a different site that compared sham ECT and real ECT in seven patients, some doubt was raised about the replicability of the acute effect of ECT on GABA levels. Nonetheless, the strength of the findings in the larger study 1 sample suggests that, unlike virtually all other biochemical indices, free plasma GABA may be reduced acutely after ECT. This acute decrease could reflect decreased levels of GABA in brain extracellular space or decreased brain turnover. In study 1, compared with ECT nonresponders, ECT responders had higher GABA levels at both baseline and after a course of ECT. Because plasma GABA levels are known to be low in a subset of patients with major depression, the higher GABA levels observed in clinical responders before and after the ECT course indirectly suggest that patients least abnormal in GABA levels may show superior clinical response. This also suggests that low plasma GABA is not a state marker for depression.
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PMID:Effects of electroconvulsive therapy on plasma GABA. 779 65

Fifty-eight patients with major depression were randomly assigned to receive a hypnotic dose of either propofol or methohexital for their complete treatment series of electroconvulsive therapy (ECT). As expected, seizure duration was significantly shorter with propofol than with methohexital anesthesia. Both groups recovered from their depression at the same rate. There was a significant improvement in the Hamilton Rating Scale for Depression scores between the first and last ECT session. However, this was independent of the choice of propofol or methohexital as the anesthetic. This study supports previous reports that seizure duration does not influence recovery from depression.
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PMID:Efficacy of electroconvulsive therapy after propofol and methohexital anesthesia. 783 58

Panic disorder (PD) is a common psychiatric illness, which has many complications such as major depression, increased suicide risk, agoraphobic avoidance behaviour, alcohol abuse and dependence. A number of studies have now documented increased rates of anxiety disorders among alcoholics and of alcoholism among patients presenting with anxiety disorders. In general, it appears that PD is more prevalent in alcoholics than would be expected on the basis of general population rates. Alcohol withdrawal is clearly associated with severe anxiety symptoms. It is suggested that repeated withdrawal episodes may trigger panic through a kindling process by causing subconvulsive stimuli with increasing amounts of electrical excitability or even spontaneous seizures. Serotonergic medications are effective in treating PD and depression. They also diminish interest in drinking in ethanol-dependent patients. Serotonergic agents can also affect conditioning and learning as well as behavioral control and self-administration. The treatment of panic patients with depressive and alcohol problems usually requires long-term treatment.
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PMID:Alcohol and depression in panic disorder. 791 95

Major depression is a common and disabling disorder with far-reaching social and economic implications. Nonetheless, major depression is treatable by one of the many currently available antidepressants with response rates of approximately 65-70%. Treatment of depression has improved in recent years because of the availability of effective and well-tolerated antidepressants, such as the selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs). The currently available antidepressants are generally equally effective and are distinguished primarily by side-effect profiles. The side effects of tricyclic antidepressants (TCAs) are attributed to their nonspecific interaction with cholinergic, histaminergic, serotonergic, and dopaminergic receptors in the central nervous system. The secondary amine TCAs, nortriptyline and desipramine, are preferred among the TCAs because of a more favorable side-effect profile. The TCAs are cardiotoxic, and overdoses are frequently fatal. Adverse effects, including potentially fatal drug and food interactions, limit the use of the monoamine oxidase inhibitors (MAOIs); however, these agents have a role in the treatment of depression with comorbid anxiety, refractory depression, atypical depression, and bulimia. The SSRIs possess a class side-effect profile of headache, nausea, and sexual dysfunction. Individual differences in side effects may distinguish fluoxetine (nervousness, restlessness), sertraline (diarrhea, loose stools), and paroxetine (dry mouth). The SSRIs all inhibit certain cytochrome P450 isoenzymes involved in the metabolism of drugs, such as the TCAs, and each SSRI has been reported to increase plasma concentrations of concomitantly administered TCAs. Bupropion therapy is associated with a risk of seizure development, which can be minimized by multiple daily doses. Trazodone is sedating and can rarely cause priapism. The related compound, nefazodone, does not cause sexual dysfunction or priapism, but is associated with sedation. Venlafaxine, a recently available antidepressant that appears to have efficacy in treatment-refractory depression, may cause nausea that requires gradual upward dosage titration. Higher doses of venlafaxine may also cause elevations in blood pressure, heart rate, and serum cholesterol. As more is learned about the pathophysiology of depression, even more specific and well-tolerated antidepressants will be developed.
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PMID:Contemporary management of depression. 799 23

Repeated electroconvulsive stimulations represent one treatment modality for depressive disorders, but the mechanism leading to its effect is largely unknown. Studies of humans and rats have indicated that neuropeptide Y (NPY) is involved in major depression and anxiety. The purpose of the present investigation was to detect changes in the expression of preproNPY mRNA in the limbic cortex of rats exposed to electroconvulsive shocks (ECS) daily for 14 days. Twenty-four hours after the last ECS, the animals were sacrificed, brain sections were hybridized with a synthetic oligonucleotide probe complimentary to rat preproNPY mRNA. Semi-quantitative in situ hybridization histochemistry revealed an about ten-fold increase of preproNPY mRNA levels over the dentate gyrus and the piriform cortex in animals exposed to ECS compared to sham-treated controls. In the dentate gyrus dipped sections showed that the increase of gene expression took place in individual neurons in the polymorph layer. In the piriform cortex a moderate increase in the number of grains was observed over many individual cells in the pyramidal layer. These data show that the expression of preproNPY mRNA is markedly increased in specific brains regions after ECS, but whether this increase is a result of the ECS-induced seizures per se, or rather should be regarded as a protective adaptation to changes in neuronal activity pattern remains to be established.
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PMID:Electroconvulsive shocks increase the expression of neuropeptide Y (NPY) mRNA in the piriform cortex and the dentate gyrus. 809 71


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