Effect of the benzodiazepine antagonist Ro 15-1788 on flunitrazepam-induced sleep changes

1 The modifications of human sleep induced by benzodiazepines, and particularly by flunitrazepam, are complex. Stage 4 and paradoxical sleep are both decreased; however, these two effects have a different evolution during and after single or short-term drug administration. 2 The benzodiazepine antagonist Ro 15-1788 also tends to depress stage 4, but with immediate recovery in the post-drug night, and does not modify paradoxical sleep. 3 In combined administration, this drug totally reverses the hypnogenic effect of flunitrazepam, as well as its effect on paradoxical sleep but not the decrease of slow wave sleep. 4 Some of the benzodiazepine-induced alterations of sleep may be related to receptors different from central benzodiazepine receptors, or to mechanisms not directly connected to this type of receptors.