Am J Psychiatry 1990; 147:621-624
Copyright © 1990 by American Psychiatric Association
Response to treatment with antidepressants of patients with severe or moderate nonpsychotic depression and of patients with psychotic depression
JH Kocsis, JL Croughan, MM Katz, TP Butler, S Secunda, CL Bowden and JM Davis
Department of Psychiatry, New York Hospital-Cornell Medical Center, NY 10021.
Hospitalized patients were divided into nonpsychotic severely depressed (N
= 53), nonpsychotic moderately depressed (N = 54), and psychotic depressed
(N = 25) groups and treated with either imipramine or amitriptyline, up to
250 mg/day, for 4 weeks. Good response occurred in 39% of the 38 severely
depressed, 67% of the 49 moderately depressed, and 32% of the 19 psychotic
depressed patients who completed treatment. The response of the patients
with nonpsychotic severe depression did not differ significantly from the
response of those with psychotic depression, and both groups fared worse
than the group with nonpsychotic moderate depression.
