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Clinical Studies of “Specific” Anxiolytics as Therapeutic Agents

  • Conference paper
Clinical Pharmacology in Psychiatry

Part of the book series: Psychopharmacology Series ((PSYCHOPHARM,volume 3))

Abstract

Anxiety disorder is the most frequent psychiatric diagnosis made in America. A recent NIMH catchment area household survey (Shapiro et al. 1984), which involved almost 10000 persons, estimated that 8.3% of the adult U. S. population had suffered from anxiety disorders during the past 6 months. The two next highest diagnostic categories were alcohol and drug abuse (6.4%) and depression (6.0%), followed by schizophrenia (1.0%). Interestingly, however, only 23% of those patients suffering from anxiety actually received treatment. These data are in agreement with those obtained in the 1979 National Household Survey conducted by Baiter’s group (Mellinger and Baiter 1981; Uhlenhuth et al. 1983), who found the following psychiatric illness prevalences for the past year: agoraphobicpanic disorder (1.2%), other phobic disorders (2.3%), generalized anxiety disorder (6.4%), and depressive disorders (5.1%). In this household survey it was again observed that only a relatively small percentage of those suffering from psychic distress and given a DSM III diagnosis as derived from the Hopkins Symptom Checklist criteria actually were treated for anxiety (Uhlenhuth et al. 1983).

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Psychiatry, University of Pennsylvania, University Hospital, 203 Piersol Building/Gl, Philadelphia, PA, 19104, USA

    K. Rickels

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  1. K. Rickels
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Pharmacology, Institute of Medical Biology, University of Tromsø School of Medicine, N-9001, Tromsø, Norway

    Svein G. Dahl Cand Real, Dr. Philos. (Professor of Pharmacology) (Professor of Pharmacology)

  2. Department of Clinical Pharmacology, School of Medicine, Odense University, DK-5000, Odense C, Denmark

    Lars F. Gram MD (Professor of Clinical Pharmacology) (Professor of Clinical Pharmacology)

  3. Clinical Neuroscience Branch, National Institute of Mental Health, Building 10, Room 4N214, 20205, Bethesda, MD, USA

    Steven M. Paul MD (Chief) (Chief)

  4. Section on Clinical Psychopharmacology, Laboratory of Clinical Science, Building 10, National Institute of Mental Health, 20205, Bethesda, MD, USA

    William Z. Potter MD, PhD (Chief) (Chief)

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© 1987 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg

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Rickels, K. (1987). Clinical Studies of “Specific” Anxiolytics as Therapeutic Agents. In: Dahl, S.G., Gram, L.F., Paul, S.M., Potter, W.Z. (eds) Clinical Pharmacology in Psychiatry. Psychopharmacology Series, vol 3. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-71288-3_11

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-71288-3_11

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-642-71290-6

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-642-71288-3

  • eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive

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