Medical trail finds maybe PTSD is a tougher nut to crack

Mental Health

Results of D-Cycloserine Therapy for PTSD Prove Underwhelming

By: KATE JOHNSON, Internal Medicine News Digital Network

MONTREAL – The addition of d-cycloserine to cognitive-behavioral therapy for the treatment of posttraumatic stress disorder showed little or no benefit over placebo, based on several studies presented at the annual meeting of the International Society for Traumatic Stress Studies.

The presentations sparked some heated debate and dampened hopes for the drug in treating posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), given that it has already shown promise in the treatment of social anxiety disorder, panic disorder, and some phobias – and might have potential in the treatment of obsessive-compulsive disorder and addictions.

"The early results are not as positive as we [had] hoped," commented Dr. Charles Marmar, professor and chair of the department of psychiatry at New York University, when asked to comment after the session. "We didn’t see much evidence today that d-cycloserine boosts the therapeutic benefit of cognitive-behavioral therapy [CBT] in PTSD," agreed Dr. Roger Pitman, director of the Massachusetts General Hospital posttraumatic stress disorder and psychophysiology laboratory and professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School, both in Boston.

But Dr. Pitman cautioned against dismissing the potential of d-cycloserine (DCS) in psychiatry. "There are several published studies now in social phobia, panic disorder, and height phobia that you can’t simply dismiss," he said in an interview. "It’s fair to conclude that DCS has the capability of bolstering cognitive-behavioral therapy by enhancing retention, but maybe PTSD is a tougher nut to crack."
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Results of D-Cycloserine Therapy for PTSD Prove Underwhelming