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Rate of switch from depression into mania after therapeutic sleep deprivation in bipolar depression
C Colombo1, F Benedetti, B Barbini
1IRCCS Istituto Scientifico Ospedale San Raffaele, Department of Neuropsychiatric Sciences, University of Milan, School of Medicine, Italy.
Abstract:
Sleep deprivation is a potentially useful non-pharmacological treatment for depression. A relationship between sleep loss and the onset of mania has been reported, so it is possible that a switch from depression into mania after sleep deprivation might be expected in bipolar depressed patients who are treated with sleep deprivation. In a sample of 206 bipolar depressed treated with three cycles of sleep deprivation, alone or in combination with heterogeneous medications, we observed a 4.85% switch rate into mania and a 5.83% switch rate into hypomania. These percentages are comparable to those observed with antidepressant drug treatments.
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