Acute antidepressant response to fluoxetine and sertraline in psychiatric outpatients with psychomotor agitation

INTRODUCTION: Sertraline and fluoxetine have different pharmacologic and pharmacokinetic profiles, which may be of clinical relevance in the determination of treatment response in different subtypes of depression. OBJECTIVE: To analyse the efficacy of sertraline and fluoxetine in a subgroup of 78 patients with evidence of significant psychomotor agitation (HAM-D item 8 h 1 and HAM-D item 9 S 2 at study entry) in a 6-week study comparing sertraline (50 - 100 mg/day) and fluoxetine (20 - 40 mg/day) for the treatment of major depression in 286 psychiatric outpatients. RESULTS: The proportion of patients with psychomotor agitation responding ( S 50% reduction HAM-D score) at last visit was significantly ( P < 0.05) higher in the sertraline group than in the fluoxetine group (62% vs 39%, respectively). Most of the secondary efficacy parameters showed significantly ( P h 0.05) greater improvement in the sertraline treatment group at last visit: HAM-D h 8, HAM-D total score, HAM-D anxiety/somatization factor, HAM-D weight factor, HAM-A total score, CGI-S, Raskin Depression score, and Covi Anxiety score. CONCLUSION: The findings of this retrospective data analysis suggest that fluoxetine may be a less efficacious antidepressant than sertraline in patients with psychomotor agitation.