SERIAL PARTIAL SLEEP-DEPRIVATION AS ADJUVANT TREATMENT OF DEPRESSIVE INSOMNIA

1. Sleep disturbance is a prominent symptom of major depression. Despi te specific treatment with antidepressants, there is a substantial num ber of patients who improve in depressed mood but remain sleep disturb ed. 2. Polysomnographic sleep (PSG) data and self reported sleep measu res were assessed at baseline and after one week in 18 patients (35-65 years) randomly assigned to treatment with either trimipramine alone 200 mg/d (group 1) or trimipramine (200 mg/d) and additional serial pa rtial sleep deprivation in the second half of the night (3x/week) (gro up 2). 3. In group 1 no marked changes between baseline and after trea tment were found. 4. In group 2 the PSG data showed a significant incr ease of slow wave Sleep and a compensatory decrease in stage 1. Sleep continuity improved in terms of numbers of awakenings, sleep onset lat ency and total. sleep time. These changes were in parallel with the su bjective estimation of sleep in group 2. 5. There was no significant d ifference in the Hamilton rating scale scores neither at baseline nor after treatment. 6. These observed effects on sleep following addition al serial PSD therapy seem to occur independent from the antidepressiv e effect.