Specific responses to imipramine and doxepin in psychoneurotic depressed patients with sleep disturbance.

The pretreatment characteristics and symptomatology that were predictive of rapid response to pharmacotherapy (imipramine or doxepin) were determined in 79 psychoneurotic depressed patients with sleep disturbance. Rapid response to treatment was measured as at least a 50% reduction in total score for the Hamilton Rating Scale for Depression after two weeks of treatment. Pretreatment severity of illness and pretreatment scoring of the somatization factor on the Hamilton Rating Scale for Depression and of the self-rating of illness on the Lipman-Rickels Scale were found to be modest predictors of response to either drug. Estimation of imipramine and doxepin response groups was more successful. A higher socioeconomic status and shorter duration of illness were indicative of a favorable response to imipramine, whereas a higher response rate to doxepin was found in male patients. The four group discriminations showed a similarity in pretreatment characteristics between imipramine responders and doxepin non-responders.