Tritiated Imipramine Binding Distinguishes Among Subtypes of Depression

Diurnal and Circannual Variation in Platelet ³H-Imipramine Binding: Comparative Data on Normal and Affectively Ill Subjects

“…Much interest has focused lately on platelet 3H-imipramine (3H-IMI) binding as a possible biological marker for affective illness [reviews: Langer and Raisman, 1983;Lewis and McChesney, 1985;Baron et al, 1986]. How ever, the considerable variability in research results has made it difficult to reach a consensus on this issue.…”

Platelet ³H-Imipramine Binding and Familial Transmission of Affective Disorders

“…Recently, Lewis and McChesney [1985] reported that using Winokur's [1979] familial classification scheme, unipolar patients with pure depressive disorder (a subtype of unipolar depression characterized by a family history of depression but not alcoholism and/or antiso cial personality) had significantly lower Braax values than unipolar patients with depressive spectrum (refers to patients with a family history of alcoholism and/or anti social personality who may or may not have relatives with depression) or sporadic depressive disease (patients without a family history of depression, alcoholism or antisocial personality). For comparison, we have reclas sified our unipolar patients according to Winokur's scheme.…”

“…Much interest has focused lately on the suggestion that reduced 3H-platelet imipramine binding is a biolog ical marker of affective illness [for reviews, see Langer and Raisman, 1983;Lewis and McChesney, 1985]. It has also been proposed that this putative marker contributes to the genetic vulnerability to affective illness [Briley et al, 1980;Raisman et al, 1981;Lewis and McChensey, 1985;Schneider et al, 1986].…”

“…Secondly, reports on normalization of Bmax after recov ery from a depressive episode [Suranyi-Cadotte et al, 1982;Langer and Raisman, 1983], and similar Bmax val ues in euthymie bipolar patients and normal controls [Berrettini et al, 1982;Mellerup et al, 1982], have been claimed to cast doubt on the 'trait' characteristics of platelet imipramine binding. Thirdly, with the excep tion of one study [Lewis and McChesney, 1985], the relation between platelet imipramine binding and the familial transmission of affective illness has not been studied systematically using operationalized instru ments for assessing familial psychopathology. In a pre vious report [Baron et al, 1986] we discussed some of these methodological issues.…”

Imipramine Binding as a Predictor of Fluoxetine Response in Depressed Patients

“…Some studies have shown a reduction either in the number of the carrier proteins for 5-HT [5][6][7] or in the number of 3H-IMI sites in depressed patients [8][9][10][11][12], although controversies exist [13][14][15][16][17], Such a reduction has been proposed as a biologi cal marker, either trait-or state-dependent, for depression [18][19][20]. However, subsequent replications of these find ings in different psychiatric conditions [for review, see 21] make the proposal of decreased 3H-IMI binding as a marker for depression no longer tenable.…”