Sleep Deprivation in social phobia and generalized anxiety disorder.
BACKGROUND
Sleep deprivation has been shown to improve depressive symptoms in some patients with major depressive disorder, but it has not been tested in patients with generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) or social phobia (SP).


METHODS
To determine if sleep deprivation altered anxiety or depressive symptoms in patients with GAD (n = 7) or SP (n = 8), we sleep deprived patients and normal controls (n = 18) for one night.


RESULTS
On one measure of anxiety, GAD patients improved compared with controls, but there were otherwise no significant change differences between controls and SP or GAD patients.


CONCLUSIONS
The lack of benefit is consistent with previous findings that sleep deprivation provides no benefit to patients with other anxiety disorders. Sleep deprivation may be a biological intervention that distinguishes anxiety from affective disorders.
Labbate
L A
LA
Medical University of South Carolina, Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Charleston, USA.
Johnson
M R
MR
Lydiard
R B
RB
Brawman-Mintzer
O
O
Emmanuel
N
N
Crawford
M
M
Kapp
R
R
Ballenger
J C
JC
D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D001008:Anxiety Disorders / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000523:psychology / Q000628:therapy*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D010698:Phobic Disorders / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000523:psychology / Q000628:therapy*; D010865:Pilot Projects; D012892:Sleep Deprivation; D016896:Treatment Outcome