Active clinical trials for "Panic Disorder"

The purpose of this study is to examine how certain brain chemicals work in patients with Panic Disorder (PD) and Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) with and without major depressive disorder (MDD). Brain chemicals that regulate emotion, anxiety, sleep, stress hormones, and other body functions bind to serotonin (5-HT1A) and benzodiazepine (BZD) receptors. Evidence suggests that 5-HT1A and BZD receptor function is abnormal in patients with PD, PTSD, and depression. This study will use positron emission tomography (PET) scans to examine BZD and 5-HT1A receptor binding potential in patients with PD and patients with PTSD with and without co-morbid MDD, as well as in healthy volunteers. This study will also determine the effects of the stress hormone cortisol on 5-HT1A and BZD receptors. The current emotional state and psychiatric, medical, and family history of potential participants will be evaluated during an initial telephone interview. After entering the study, participants will be asked questions about general mood, degree of nervousness, and behavior. A physical examination, an electrocardiogram (EKG), and tests of intelligence and cognition will be given. Urine, blood, and saliva samples will be taken. Women will be given pregnancy tests and tests to determine menstrual phase and time of ovulation. All volunteers will undergo magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and PET scans of the brain. ...

The objectives of this survey was to retrospectively collect and evaluate the information on the efficacy and safety of PAXIL tablets ("PAXIL", hereinafter) in pediatric subjects (aged under 18) with panic disorder under conditions of actual use.

The aim of this study is to determine whether blood levels of lithium or sertraline are affected by different phases of the menstrual cycle and whether there is an effect on psychiatric symptoms. Subjects are seen for two visits: one visit during the luteal phase and one visit during the follicular phase of the menstrual cycle. On each visit, they will fill out a depression, anxiety and mania rating scale. Also at each visit a 20mL blood sample will be drawn to measure progesterone level and either a lithium or sertraline level, depending on which medication the patient takes. The primary hypothesis in this study is that blood levels of lithium and sertraline will be significantly lower in women during the luteal phase of the menstrual cycle than during the follicular phase. Examination will also be made of whether symptoms will increase in severity during the luteal phase as compared to the follicular phase. The investigators expect a negative linear association between symptom severity and blood level, i.e. expect symptom severity to worsen as blood levels of lithium or sertraline decrease.

The purpose of these questionnaires is to give us an overview of how panic has affected your life and perhaps also to give us some clues about things that may have set you up to experience panic.

Special investigation of long term use of sertraline, 52 Week Observation, Long-Term Safety. The objective of this "Special investigation" is to collect information about 1) adverse drug reactions not expected from the LPD (unknown adverse drug reactions), 2) the incidence of adverse drug reactions in this surveillance, and 3) factors considered to affect the safety and/or efficacy of this drug regarding long time use.

This study will evaluate pregnant women with a past or current diagnosis of depression or anxiety to gain a better understanding of how these disorders can affect an infant's development, both during and after pregnancy.

Objective: To examine respiratory/physiological and subjective responding as well as genetic transmission among offspring of parents with a history of or current panic disorder (PD) diagnosis to determine whether diagnoses/symptoms, endophenotypes, or genetic profiles in offspring is differentially related to parent PD subtypes (i.e., respiratory and non-respiratory panic). Study population: Approximately 400 offspring of about 200 parents with current or past PD. Approximately 200 offsping/100 parents with PD will be enrolled at NIH/NIMH and the remainder at Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond, VA. Design: A high-risk family design will be used wherein parents with either a current or past diagnosis of PD who have an offspring(s) (ages 9 to 20) will be recruited. <TAB> Outcome measures: Outcome measures will include physiological recordings of respiratory, cardiac, and electrodermal responding during a 10 minute baseline followed by 15 minutes of 5% carbon dioxide enriched air (CO2). Research participants also will complete parent and child self-report measures and provide a DNA sample using a saliva protocol. A full listing of self-reports is provided in the Outcome Measures Section.

Cognitive behavior therapy (CBT) has long been known as an effective treatment for anxiety disorders, either when given by a therapist or when self-administered through a computer program. However, the biological effect of CBT remained largely unexplored. Most studies focused on genomic differences and pursued differences in methylation patterns following CBT, but the findings were very limited in scope, especially when comparing responders and non-responders to CBT. In the currently proposed study, the investigators plan to go one step further and look for changes in exosomal microRNAs (miRs) from serum samples taken before and after CBT from Panic Disorder (PD) patients. Notably, miR changes show a much faster biological response than methylation patterns yet had never been used before in PD research. The primary benefit of this work will be in providing biological validation to psychological treatments. PD is a heavy public health burden, associated with significant market potential for both therapeutic and diagnostic uses.

The purpose of this study is to use functional magnetic resonance imaging to investigate how the human brain learns to form associations between neutral and emotional stimuli. The study is based on the basic principles of Pavlovian conditioning. When someone learns that a neutral stimulus (such as the sound of a bell) predicts an unpleasant stimulus (such as a mild electrical shock), the neutral stimulus takes on the properties of an emotional stimulus. The investigators are interested in the neural processes involved in this learning in people with a clinical anxiety disorder and posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD).

The study aims at comparing virtual reality therapy (VRT) with a usual cognitive behavior therapy (CBT) program for agoraphobia. A waiting list represents the control condition. The investigators' purpose is to test a pure VRT compared with a pure CBT, as previous works suggest that the combination of the two methods are clinically effective. Patients receive a two-page information leaflet about the trial and sign an informed consent. After the first evaluation, they are randomized, in three centers (Lyon, Paris, Luxemburg), either to VRT (12 sessions) or CBT (12 sessions), or a waiting-list control condition for three months. After three months the waiting list is randomized to VRT or CBT. The follow-up is one year from entry into the active part of the trial.