Effects of Duloxetine on Fear Conditioning in Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)
Status:
Completed
Trial end date:
2009-12-01
Target enrollment:
Participant gender:
Summary
Chronic posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is a debilitating disorder and treatment
response to pharmacological interventions has been modest for these patients. Chronic
elevated anxiety and associated psychophysiological parameters including increased heart rate
and alterations in skin conductance are key symptoms of chronic PTSD. Selective serotonin
reuptake inhibitors (SRIs) are considered treatment of first choice for these patients,
however a substantial portion of patients treated with SRIs do not respond sufficiently.
Therefore, there is a need to establish novel and effective treatment strategies for these
patients. Recently, duloxetine has received considerable attention since it was shown in
multiple controlled trials to be an effective treatment for people with major depressive
disorder (MDD), a condition which is often co-morbid with PTSD. In chronic PTSD, the
psychophysiological responses at baseline and in response to treatment with duloxetine have
been inadequately studied and may provide novel insight into antidepressant and anxiolytic
mechanisms of this compound.
Primary Aim 1: Evaluate the anxiolytic and antidepressant effects of duloxetine in patients
with chronic PTSD.
Secondary Aim 2: Evaluate the effects of duloxetine on fear conditioned psychophysiological
responses (including startle eyeblink, skin conductance, and cardiovascular inter-beat
interval) at baseline and after 8 weeks of naturalistic treatment in chronic PTSD patients.