Psychological performance in anxious patients treated with diazepam

Treatment, discontinuation, and psychomotor effects of diazepam in women with generalized anxiety disorder

Twenty-one women with generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) participated in a 6-week, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial to assess the treatment and abrupt withdrawal effects of diazepam on psychic and somatic symptoms of anxiety. The results confirmed those of previous studies reporting that (1) clinical doses of diazepam are effective in attenuating the symptoms of generalized anxiety to a greater extent than placebo during the first 3 weeks of treatment; (2) somatic symptoms are more responsive to diazepam treatment than psychic symptoms; and (3) patients taking diazepam exhibit increased anxiety upon abrupt withdrawal of medication. This finding, combined with the fact that diazepam discontinuation did not produce withdrawal effects in non-anxious volunteers, suggests that diazepam discontinuation after 6 weeks results in rebound anxiety rather than a physical withdrawal syndrome. Diazepam did not improve psychomotor performance in GAD patients. Psychomotor impairment after 6 weeks of diazepam was similar to that seen in nonanxious volunteers.

Psychological performance of anxious patients in tests used in anxiolytic drug trials

Tested sixty anxious inpatients under drug free conditions with a performance battery commonly used for the evaluation of impairment deficits in anxiolytic drug trials to examine the interrelations among the various performance tasks and to gain some preliminary indication of the underlying factor structure. A factor of general performance ability accounted for 40% of the total variance and contributed to the performance of tasks with cognitive as well as motor components. Performance was related to age and intellectual efficacy, while personality variables and state anxiety had a transcurable influence on performance.

Psychological performance of normal subjects on tasks commonly used in evaluation of anxiolytic drugs

A battery of performance tasks together with some personality inventories commonly used in drug evaluation studies were administered to 60 normal subjects to study the intercorrelations among measures and to gain some preliminary indications of their factor structure. Speed of psychomotor performance accounted for 30% of the total variance.