Am J Psychiatry 1984; 141:250-252
Copyright © 1984 by American Psychiatric Association
The dexamethasone suppression test in residual schizophrenia with depression
JG Munro, TM Hardiker and DP Leonard
The authors administered the Carroll rating scale for depression to 100
patients with residual schizophrenia and found that 41 were also depressed.
Of these 41 patients, 23 were given a dexamethasone suppression test; 7
(31%) failed to suppress cortisol. A matched control group, i.e., 23
patients with residual schizophrenia but without depression, suppressed
cortisol normally after taking dexamethasone. The authors found no clinical
differences between depressed patients with normal DST results and
depressed patients with abnormal DST results.
