34 research outputs found
Monoaminergic and histaminergic strategies and treatments in brain diseases
The monoaminergic systems are the target of several drugs for the treatment of mood, motor and cognitive disorders as well as neurological conditions. In most cases, advances have occurred through serendipity, except for Parkinson's disease where the pathophysiology led almost immediately to the introduction of dopamine restoring agents. Extensive neuropharmacological studies first showed that the primary target of antipsychotics, antidepressants, and anxiolytic drugs were specific components of the monoaminergic systems. Later, some dramatic side effects associated with older medicines were shown to disappear with new chemical compounds targeting the origin of the therapeutic benefit more specifically. The increased knowledge regarding the function and interaction of the monoaminergic systems in the brain resulting from in vivo neurochemical and neurophysiological studies indicated new monoaminergic targets that could achieve the efficacy of the older medicines with fewer side-effects. Yet, this accumulated knowledge regarding monoamines did not produce valuable strategies for diseases where no monoaminergic drug has been shown to be effective. Here, we emphasize the new therapeutic and monoaminergic-based strategies for the treatment of psychiatric diseases. We will consider three main groups of diseases, based on the evidence of monoamines involvement (schizophrenia, depression, obesity), the identification of monoamines in the diseases processes (Parkinson's disease, addiction) and the prospect of the involvement of monoaminergic mechanisms (epilepsy, Alzheimer's disease, stroke). In most cases, the clinically available monoaminergic drugs induce widespread modifications of amine tone or excitability through neurobiological networks and exemplify the overlap between therapeutic approaches to psychiatric and neurological conditions. More recent developments that have resulted in improved drug specificity and responses will be discussed in this review.peer-reviewe
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Problems with currently available antidepressants
Although options for pharmacologic treatment for depression have grown seemingly exponentially over the past several decades, the current armamentarium of antidepressants continues to have limitations of both efficacy and tolerability. The problems include an unacceptable lack of efficacy, delayed onset of therapeutic effects, an inability to predict responses to one or another agent, drug-drug interactions, and difficulty with tolerability during both acute and chronic treatment. This article reviews the problems that persist in the use of currently available antidepressant medications and presents a list of attributes that would be characteristic of the ideal antidepressant
Neurobehavioral effects of interferon-alpha in cancer patients : phenomenology and paroxetine responsiveness of symptom dimensions
International audienc
Experimental evidence for cyclic and spontaneous migration of cesium on rhenium and tungsten
Convergences in Course of Illness and Treatments of the Epilepsies and Recurrent Affective Disorders
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