Word: iproniazid
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Dates: during 1957-1957
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After years in which medical headlines went to tranquilizing drugs, it looks as though 1957's drug of the year is an anti-tranquilizer. Its name: iproniazid. Dropped like a hot potato after 1951 trials against tuberculosis because of admittedly unpleasant and possibly serious side effects, iproniazid was shunned until about a year ago, when psychiatrists decided that it might be useful against deep, unshakable states of depression. The first few researchers got encouraging results (TIME, April 15). A fortnight ago, at a Manhattan conference sponsored by Hoffmann-La Roche, Inc., which markets the prescription drug, more psychiatrists affirmed...
...Rockland State Hospital reported, the drug is equally effective as a "psychic energizer" for long-term hospital patients and the at-large depressed whom he sees in private practice. One woman's depression, which had defied seven years of psychoanalysis and two years of tranquilizers, yielded dramatically to iproniazid. Equally striking is the case of a professor of medicine who suffers from occasional dizziness and constipation on heavy iproniazid dosage, but refuses to cut down because he would rather suffer these than risk a recurrence of the depression that has handicapped him for twelve years and sometimes crippled...
Electric shock treatment for stubborn cases of depression has been steadily reduced in the tranquilizer era. While it still may not be eliminated, it can now be largely replaced by iproniazid, reported Dr. Theodore Robie of New Jersey's Orange Memorial Hospital. He got good results in 46 out of 50 patients kept on the drug, believes that shock can now be safely withheld unless the patient is "aggressively suicidal...
...opposite of tranquilizers, e.g., energizers such as iproniazid, are being widely tested in the U.S. and Europe. Rockland (N.Y.) State Hospital's Dr. Nathan S. Kline, who introduced iproniazid as an energizer, suggested that it may prove as important as all the tranquilizers combined in releasing big numbers of patients from hospital wards. Then, taking a flying leap into the future, he foresaw a brave new world in which mind-improving drugs will be used not only to alleviate illnesses but to improve the performance of the healthy...
...psychiatrists have tried iproniazid on a handful of office patients. They reported excitingly good results in cases of depression lasting as long as six years. But use of iproniazid for such patients is tricky: the drug is powerful and potentially dangerous. Strictly a prescription item, best used in hospitals, iproniazid is far from being everybody's happiness pill...