[Studies on the effect of drugs on somatosensory cortical evoked potentials (author's transl)]

The effect of the following drugs in therapeutic doses on somatosensory cortical evoked potentials was studied: methamphetamine, chlorpromazine, imipramine, diazepam, phenobarbital, pethidine, and novaminesulfone. Physiological saline was used as control. Each of these compounds was studied in 5 healthy subjects. Three evoked potentials were recorded before, and another three after administration of the drug. Each potential was averaged from 1024 single stimuli. None of the drugs, led to marked changes of the evoked potential, i.e., all data (latencies, amplitudes) were within the double standard deviation of the data obtained in normal subjects in a previous study. Although no significant changes were seen, some trends could be observed: methamphetamine and imipramine produced a decrease in the latency of the first positive peak, chlorpromazine increased the latency of the third positive peak. The amplitude of the third peak was reduced under phenobarbital. It is concluded that the drugs investigated in the presents study do not produce significant changes in the somatosensory cortical evoked potential and therefore drug application may be continued when evoked potentials are used for diagnostic purposes.