[The effect of dalargin on the opioid and immune systems in patients with a depressive syndrome].

Depressed patients and healthy donors received dalargin. As shown by the radioreceptor test, the patients recovered normal quantitative and qualitative values of plasma opioid activity due to this drug which is a synthetic agonist of sigma-type opioid receptors. Lymphocyte proliferative activity (spontaneous and induced by polyclonal mitogens) was not significantly different in the test subjects versus the donors, though in vitro studies revealed multidirectional homeostatic effects of dalargin. It is shown that depressions are associated with defective relationships between functions of the immune and opioid system. Dalargin proved uneffective in the treatment of endogenic psychotic depressions, whereas in reactive neurotic depressions and psychosomatic abnormalities the drug is promising and needs further investigations.