Where are the new therapies for anxiety and obsessive-compulsive disorders?

The benzodiazepines have monopolized the acute anxiety market for about 40 years, but their potential for tolerance and dependency has stimulated an interest in alternative anxiolytics. Until recently, however, attention has focused on existing drugs such as monoamine oxidase inhibitors, tricyclic antidepressants, selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors. The 5-HT1A partial agonist, buspirone (Bristol-Myers-Squibb), is one of the few compounds developed principally as an anxiolytic since the benzodiazepines. The challenge for the future is not only to find efficacious treatments with a rapid onset of action and an acceptable side effect profile but also to determine the optimal compounds for each of the different anxiety disorders.