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Psychological and Clinical Investigation of the Treatment of Anxious Out-Patients with Three Barbiturates and Placebo

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 January 2018

Evelyn Reynolds ,
C. R. B. Joyce ,
J. L. Swift ,
P. H. Tooley  and
M. Weatherall
Evelyn Reynolds
Affiliation:
Department of Pharmacology, The London Hospital Medical College, Turner Street, E.1
C. R. B. Joyce
Affiliation:
Department of Pharmacology, The London Hospital Medical College, Turner Street, E.1
J. L. Swift
Affiliation:
Department of Psychiatry, The London Hospital, E.1
P. H. Tooley
Affiliation:
Department of Psychiatry, The London Hospital, E.1
M. Weatherall
Affiliation:
Department of Pharmacology, The London Hospital Medical College, E.1
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Extract

Barbiturates arc commonly used in treating anxious, disturbed patients. Well controlled trials have shown that at least amylobarbitone (‘Amytal’) is therapeutically active (Scott, 1955; Raymond, Lucas, Beesley, O'Connell and Fraser Roberts, 1957; Robin, 1959), and that a newer barbiturate, nealbarbitone (‘Censedal’) is, weight for weight, equally effective (Robin, Cronin and Scotton, 1961). Since nealbarbitone is less hypnotic (Ryde, 1959; Hinton, 1963), it may be used in larger doses than are expedient with amylobarbitone, and this could make it more useful in controlling anxiety. Phenobarbitone is widely used, especially in general practice, to relieve symptoms of anxiety. Its activity in experimental animals, for example in preventing electrically induced convulsions without causing sleep, differs considerably from that of amylobarbitone (Merritt and Putnam, 1938), but it appears not to have been compared directly with amylobarbitone in a controlled clinical trial upon patients with anxiety.

Type
Research Article
Information
The British Journal of Psychiatry , Volume 111 , Issue 470 , January 1965 , pp. 84 - 95
Copyright
Copyright © Royal College of Psychiatrists, 1965 

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