Am J Psychiatry 1978; 135:552-556
Copyright © 1978 by American Psychiatric Association
Prediction of antidepressant responses to lithium
EF Donnelly, FK Goodwin, IN Waldman and DL Murphy
The authors studied 53 patients hospitalized for depression to evaluate
possible associations between pretreatment responses to the Minnesota
Multiphasic Personality Inventory and behaviorally rated responses to
lithium. Patients were randomly assigned to two groups (A and B) in which
responders and nonresponders were balanced for sex. For the 18 women in
group A, a lithium response scale discriminated responders with 89%
accuracy. For the 9 males, a separate scale discriminated responders with
100% accuracy. In a cross-validation, the two scales discriminated
responders and nonresponders with 100% accuracy in group B. The empirical
methodology of this study suggests an alternative to the
theoretical-rational approach of predicting response to antidepressant
drugs based on pretreatment depressive symptoms.
