Multicentric Double-Blind Study Comparing Efficacy and Safety of Minaprine and Imipramine in Dysthymic Disorders

Abstract

This multicentre study compares the therapeutic efficacy and safety of minaprine (200 mg) to that of imipramine (50, 75, 100 mg) in the treatment of patients over 40 years suffering from dysthymic disorders as diagnosed according to DSM III. After 4–7 days on placebo, 67 patients were randomly assigned to receive either drug for a period of 6 weeks in a double-blind manner. As rated by the Hamilton Depression Rating Scale and evaluated by exploratory statistics, minaprine showed similar efficacy to imipramine in these patients. Minaprine was better tolerated than imipramine according to the physicians’ tolerance rating (p < 0.05) and produced significantly fewer symptoms of the autonomic nervous system as compared to imipramine (p < 0.01).

Transdiagnostic Clinical Global Impression Scoring for Routine Clinical Settings

“…We created the anchors by comparing the results from the investigator’s survey with the published anchors for disease-specific CGI ratings. These comparisons found consistency between the factors emphasized by the investigators and the components included across the various disease-specific CGI anchors [ 19 , 20 , 21 , 22 , 23 , 24 , 25 , 26 ]. Of the disease-specific anchors, we considered those developed by Shear and colleagues for complicated grief to be the anchors most appropriately extended to a transdiagnostic version.…”

“…For the CGI, the rater’s experience may also be a source of variability, given the scale’s instruction to “consider his [sic] total clinical experience with the given population” in making the rating [ 14 ]. More detailed anchor point descriptions for the CGI scales are therefore necessary to improve inter-rater reliability, and have been developed by several groups for illness-specific versions of the CGI [ 19 , 20 , 21 , 22 , 23 , 24 , 25 , 26 ].…”