Search PubMed⌕ Search

Biomedical subjects

B Shopsin

Publications and source records attributed to B Shopsin.

At least 37 records · Page 2Linked to original sources
PubMed1980

Lithium as an immunologic adjuvant.

Lithium, an adenylate cyclase inhibitor, stimulates a variety of in vitro indices of immune function, including proliferation of lymphocytes in response to mitogens, rosette formation by T-cells and phagocytosis by macrophages. Lithium enhances these immunologic responses at concentrations comparable to those achieved in patients receiving lithium for treatment of manic-depressive disorders. Lithium may prove to have important therapeutic applications as an immune adjuvant, particularly in immune deficiency states associated with excessive C-AMP production.

Adjuvants, Immunologic↗
PubMed1980

Psychiatric morbidity in the offspring of patients with affective disorders. A preliminary report.

40 randomly selected patients with bipolar, unipolar and schizoaffective illness were interviewed about their 85 male and female first-degree offspring using the Conner's Parent Questionnaire and the Greenhill Brief Sociopathy Scale. Although there was a conspicuous absence of homologous illness in the offspring, the highest incidence of psychiatric symptoms was found in male offspring and adopted offspring of all diagnostic categories and the male and female children of bipolar parents. One third of the bipolar probands and one-fourth of the unipolar probands were reported by their parents to have motor-behavior problems. The symptom profile may be the harbinger to forbode more formal psychiatric difficulties in adulthood.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1980

Second generation antidepressants.

One approach to research into depressive illness includes a clinical pharmacotherapeutic tack such as the use of investigational drugs with defined pharmacological and biochemical activity. Using this research strategem, a variety of new compounds have been investigated in recent years all of which are unique chemically; all differ from the classic tricyclic-MAOI compounds. Animal pharmacology and neurochemical studies also show a profile which largely differs from the standard reference compounds. Their effects on central monoamine metabolism differ widely; some act pre- and others postsynaptically, some act by re-uptake inhibition, others by enhancing release, others are precursors, while still others are receptor agonists; some have no apparent central effect. The data, considered collectively and critically evaluated, suggest that many of the newer compounds used investigationally, because of their clinical efficacy, seriously question the involvement of monoamines as responsible for either the antidepressant effect of the standard psychotropic drugs or as etiopathogenic in the affective disorders. The classic animal screening profiles used for predicting antidepressant drug efficacy in man do not hold for many of these newer antidepressants. the animal-laboratory models need be revised and reoriented towards finding similar molecules that are devoid of the addling side effects and contraindications of the existing standard tricyclic-MAOI genre. The newer second generation antidepressants stand as a hallmark of progress in research and treatment with psychotropic drugs.

Antidepressive Agents, Tricyclic↗
PubMed1979

Clozapine, chlorpromazine, and placebo in newly hospitalized, acutely schizophrenic patients: a controlled, double-blind comparison.

Clozapine is a unique compound belonging to a relatively new group of antipsychotic agents, the dibenzazepines. To our knowledge, the present study represents the first double-blind, controlled comparison recorded in the United States. The data suggest that clozapine in the present population of newly admitted, acutely psychotic schizophrenic individuals, and in the doses employed, was more effective in overall improvement response, discharge rate, and ameliorating discrete symptoms across the different objective rating scales used than was chlorpromazine (Thorazine) hydrochloride. Placebo was ineffective. Unlike chlorpromazine, no extrapyramidal reactions occurred in those patients ingesting clozapine. Clozapine was also beneficial in reversing abnormal involuntary motor movements. It is an excellent anxiolytic and hypnotic agent. Sedation, hypotension, and hypersalivation are among the more common side effects observed.

Acute Disease↗
PubMed1979

HLA antigen and affective disorders: a report and critical assessment of histocompatibility studies.

The distribution of 50 HLA antigens, of the A, B and C loci, was investigated in 38 affectively ill Caucasian patients of Eastern European Jewish ancestry. The frequencies found were compared to those of a control population matched for race as well as geographic and ethnic-religious origins. Results indicate that a negative association exists between affective disorders and Cw3 and also suggests a similar negative association between such disorders and A9. A positive association with Bw16, Bw22 and Cw1 is also indicated; Bw16 was increased in those patients with no family history of psychological illness. A review of the available literature in this area shows a glaring lack of agreement among the studies. Methodological problems exist which are likely to contribute to the variable and conflicting results and might make comparison of data irrelevant. The lack of agreement of data among the studies may also indicate that no HLA disease association exists but rather reflect the existence of a defective gene in the HLA complex but not a part of the HLA system. Additional population and family studies are required before any definitive statements can be made.

Bipolar Disorder↗
PubMed1978

Dopamine receptor stimulation in the treatment of depression: piribedil (ET-495).

ET-495, a putative central dopamine receptor stimulant, was givem to endogenously depressed individuals, all of whom were largely unresponsive to previous drug treatment. The drug exhibited a rapid and, in some cases, a pronounced antidepressant effect. This effect was short-lived, however, and, within a brief period, depression returned accompanied by a consistent syndrome of anger, irritability, hostility and poor temper control. In one individual with a bipolar history, the induction of a paranoid psychosis and auditory hallucinosis occurred. While the data suggests a role for dopamine in the symptomatic relief of depression in man, they also imply that this monoamine cannot, in and of itself, be considered as the primum movens in either the action of other (established) antidepressant drugs, or as underlying depressive illness.

Adjustment Disorders↗
PubMed1978

Enhancement of the antidepressant response to L-tryptophan by a liver pyrrolase inhibitor: a rational treatment approach.

In an open preliminary investigation, pre- and concomitant treatment with a liver pyrrolase inhibitor allopurinol to depressed male outpatients receiving L-tryptophan suggests a rational approach to treatment with this serotonin precursor. The combination is both safe and apparently effective; the rapidity of response in some patients underscores the clinical effects. Implications are that serotonin, or rather an excess in serotonin, is involved in the symptomatic relief of depressions in man.

Adult↗
PubMed1977

Penfluridol: an open phase III study in acute newly admitted hospitalized schizophrenic patients.

An open study was carried out in 17 acutely ill, newly admitted, floridly psychotic schizophrenic patients to a city hospital in New York. Penfluridol was given on a daily basis up to doses of 120 mg and patients were rated objectively by means of different psychometric evaluations; vital signs were monitored daily as were side effects. The drug was found to be a rapid acting, well-tolerated, and highly effective antipsychotic agent within the population of patients explored and within the dose range used. It was particularly effective in acutely agitated floridly paranoid schizophrenics; a statistically significant impact was achieved by 7 days and usually within 72 h after initiating treatment. The drug appears unique in that (1) its effects are realized without the untoward and usually troublesome effects of nonspecific sedation attendant upon the use of many other 'neuroleptic' medications, and (2) even within the relatively high doses used it produced no hypotensive effects. It is concluded that this appears to be a unique antipsychotic agent and a potentially important addition to the treatment armamentarium of both acute and chronic schizophrenic individuals.

Acute Disease↗