Moclobemide (Ro 11-1163) safety in depressed patients

Safety aspects were compared in 2203 patients given moclobemide and 1214 who received other antidepressants or placebo. A total of 2294 adverse events were reported by patients on moclobemide, mainly subjective symptoms (28.6%). Adverse events such as dry mouth, tremor, sweating, dizziness and constipation occurred much more frequently among 681 patients treated with various tricyclic antidepressants than in the 694 moclobemide patients with whom they were compared. Among 271 placebo-treated patients there were 287 adverse events, compared with 386 events in the 285 moclobemide patients in the same studies. Hypertensive episodes or food-drug interactions were reported by 19 patients on moclobemide and 5 on other antidepressants, but in only 2 of the former was ingestion of cheese a possible cause of headache. The assessment of tolerance on moclobemide was essentially the same as for placebo. Of the 1401 moclobemide patients in the electronic database, only 3.2% stopped treatment prematurely because of poor tolerance; the rates were higher for tranylcypromine, nomifensine, desipramine, clomipramine, amitriptyline and imipramine. During treatment, 6 patients attempted suicide with moclobemide alone (950-2000 mg) or together with imipramine (300 mg and 1200 mg). None of the intoxications was life-threatening.