[The use of nifedipine for overcoming the insufficient preventive effect of lithium carbonate in patients with affective and schizoaffective psychoses].

26 patients with affective and schizoaffective psychoses either therapeutically resistant to lithium salts or with intolerance to them were treated. Control period of preventive therapy (lithium carbonate in average doses O.6-O.9 g daily) and experimental period (nifedipine, average doses 30-40 mg daily) were equal in duration, 2 years exactly. Preventive effect of nifedipine exceeded the same effect of lithium carbonate in 65.4% of patients. The total duration of affective attacks in the experimental period was reduced on 46.8% and their frequency-on 31.7% in comparison with the control period. A number of hospital admissions decreased (on 52.2%) with a simultaneous tendency to transition of a disease to a more light level (a number of attacks of cyclothymic level increased on 17.3%). The data gives ground for the perspectives of application of nifedipine in the cases of insufficient prophylactic effect or intolerance to lithium salts.