The two diagnostic Newcastle Scales for depression have been evaluated in a drug trial with antidepressants. By use of latent structure analysis (Rasch models) it was found that two dimensions are necessary for describing the diagnosis of depression, one for endogenous features and one for reactive features. Of the depressed patients 50% had a pure endogenous depression, 14% had a pure reactive depression, 32% had mixed endogenous and reactive depression, and 4% had uncertain diagnosis. In the pure endogenous depression group 77% had a monotonically non-decreasing improvement curve during treatment whereas in the other diagnostic categories around 50% had such an improvement.

Adjustment Disorders↗

PubMedDate not supplied

Selected ion monitoring assay for the antidepressant mianserin in human plasma with stable isotope labeled analog as internal standard.

A quantitative gas chromatographic/mass spectrometric (GC/MS) assay was developed for the determination of Mianserin in human plasma. The assay utilizes selected ion monitoring in a GLC effluent, the molecular ion of Mianserin generated by electron impact ionization. Mianserin-d3, site specific, was synthesized and used as an internal standard. The assay can measure 5 ng/mL of drug with about 5% precision. The curve relating the amounts of drug added to control plasma versus the ion intensity ratio at m/e 264-267 is a straight line with a slope of 0.99 + 0.02 and zero intercept. The method was used for the analysis of drug in plasma of patients maintained on Mianserin therapy. Assay specificity was confirmed by complete identity of the mass spectrum of Mianserin in the biological extract with that of the authentic material.

Deuterium↗

PubMedDate not supplied

Psychophysiologic circadian rhythmometry on manic-depressive twins.

Rhythmometry on emotionally disturbed identical twins is applied for study of possible emotional chronopathology. Several circadian rhythmic variables are apparently 24-h synchronized in both twins, during a study span associated with mania in one twin and apparently 'normal' behavior in the other. While the data span of 3 weeks does not allow validation of any desynchronization with a period quite near to 24 h in the case of a manic girl, it does not rule out the possibility of uncoupling of an adrenal cortical cycle, gauged by the circadian rhythm in urinary 17-ketosteroid excretion. The question whether circadian or other dyschronism was present, and, if so, represented a trivial corollary or, perhaps, a determinant of emotional pathology, remains unanswered. The methodology here illustrated and added tests of differences in rhythm characteristics are likely to provide answers to such questions when they are combined with therapeutic manipulations and the search for possible chronobiotic drugs.

17-Ketosteroids↗