http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed?term=ssri homicide
Prim Care Companion CNS Disord. 2012;14(4). pii: PCC.12br01363. doi: 10.4088/PCC.12br01363. Epub 2012 Aug 23.
Two cases of zolpidem-associated homicide.
Paradis CM, Siegel LA, Kleinman SB.
Source
Department of Psychology, Marymount Manhattan College, New York, and Department of Psychiatry, The State University of New York, Downstate Medical Center, Brooklyn (Dr Paradis); Department of Psychiatry, New York University, New York (Dr Siegel); and Department of Psychiatry, Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons, New York (Dr Kleinman), New York.
Abstract
Zolpidem is the most commonly prescribed medication for the short-term treatment of insomnia. Adverse reactions include nightmares, confusion, and memory deficits. Reported rare adverse neuropsychiatric reactions include sensory distortions such as hallucinations. Previous research has identified 4 factors that may place a patient at increased risk of zolpidem-associated psychotic or delirious reactions: (1) concomitant use of a selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor (SSRI), (2) female gender, (3) advanced age, and (4) zolpidem doses of 10 mg or higher. In this article, 2 cases are presented in which individuals killed their spouses and claimed total or partial amnesia. Neither individual had a history of aggressive behavior. Both had concomitantly taken 10 mg or more of zolpidem in addition to an SSRI (paroxetine).
PMID: 23251862 [PubMed - in process] PMCID: PMC3505131
Online:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3505131/
Psychopharmacology (Berl). 2012 Aug;222(3):499-506. doi: 10.1007/s00213-012-2668-2. Epub 2012 Mar 7.
Antidepressants and lethal violence in the Netherlands 1994-2008.
Bouvy PF, Liem M.
Source
Department of Psychiatry, Erasmus Medical Centre, Postbus 2040, 3000 CA Rotterdam, The Netherlands.
[email protected]
Abstract
RATIONALE:
There is an ongoing discussion on the relation between risk of violent behaviour and the use of antidepressants. The claim that the use of antidepressants can cause violent behaviour would gain credibility if a positive association between the two could be established.
OBJECTIVE:
The objective of this study is to evaluate the relationship between homicide, suicide and homicide-suicide rates and the rates of antidepressant use by gender and age group.
METHOD:
Nationwide data from the Netherlands on antidepressant prescriptions (ADs, SSRI and venlafaxine) and lethal violence were analysed over the 15-year period from 1994 to 2008.
RESULTS:
The findings indicated a significant negative association between lethal violence (homicide and suicide) and prescription of antidepressants in the Netherlands, indicating that in a period in which the exposure of the Dutch population to antidepressants increased, rates of lethal violence decreased.
CONCLUSIONS:
These data lend no support for an important role of antidepressant use in lethal violence.
Comment in
Antidepressants and lethal violence in the Netherlands. [Psychopharmacology (Berl). 2012]
PMID: 22395429 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE] PMCID: PMC3395354
Online:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3395354/
Neuropsychopharmacol Hung. 2008 May;10(2):103-6.
Ayahuasca versus violence--a case report.
Frecska E.
Source
National Institute of Psychiatry and Neurology, Budapest, Hungary.
[email protected]
Abstract
We have limited resources available for the treatment and prevention of violent behavior. The usefulness of the most commonly used medications, namely the selective serotonin-reuptake inhibitor [SSRI] agents for the above purpose is a debated issue in the psychiatric literature. The aim of this case report is to add an ethnopharmacological perspective to the management of human aggression. Particularly, attention is called to the potential prosocial effect of the Amazonian beverage, ayahuasca--a decoctum, which has been used traditionally for multiple medico-religious purposes by numerous indigenous groups of the Upper Amazon--and has been found to be useful in crisis intervention, achieving redemption, as well as eliciting cathartic feelings with moral content.
PMID: 18959142 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]
Am J Orthopsychiatry. 2002 Jul;72(3):445-55.
Prozac and crime: who is the victim?
Mason SE.
Source
Wurzweiler School of Social Work, Yeshiva University, New York, New York 10033, USA.
[email protected]
Abstract
Prozac has been cited in more medication defense criminal cases in the United States than has any other psychotropic drug. In the majority of these cases, defendants are arguing that they are the victims of the drug. Defendants assert that they are victimized by their own involuntary intoxication or that of witnesses and crime victims who have been adversely influenced by Prozac. This article reviews 12 criminal cases in the United States in which Prozac victimization is a salient theme, and it calls for mental health professional organizations to intervene in a growing legal conundrum.
PMID: 15792056 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]
BMJ. 2004 Dec 11;329(7479):1365.
Documents missing from a 10 year old murder case sent to the BMJ.
Lenzer J.
PMID: 15591556 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE] PMCID: PMC535489
Online:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC535489/
a taste:
The BMJ has been given a set of documents that mysteriously went missing from a US mass murder case 10 years ago. The killer was taking a selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor at the time of the murders.
The internal drug company documents marked “Confidential,” which were sent to the BMJ by an anonymous source, indicate a link between a selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor and a side effect, known as the “activation syndrome,” which includes agitation, mania, and hostility.
The BMJ has offered to turn the documents over to officials of the Food and Drug Administration, but no one at the FDA was available to comment as the BMJ went to press.
The documents were sent to the BMJ as a federal circuit court judge ruled on 3 December that Pfizer must turn over internal research documents to the defence counsel for a boy charged with murdering his grandparents.​grandparents.
...
One of Christopher Pittman's attorneys, Karen Barth Menzies of Los Angeles, told the BMJ that
Pfizer's documents were important because they showed that some of Pfizer's own scientists had expressed concern that sertraline could cause violence.
Peter Breggin, a psychiatrist who served as the scientific expert in a review of over 100 cases of murder and suicide allegedly related to the antidepressant fluoxetine (Prozac), told the BMJ that the newer selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors cause an “activation syndrome” that is similar to the effect of amphetamines and that their dangers are akin to the dangers of street drugs. “Why do we think that simply because a doctor prescribes a medication they lose their dangerous effects?” he said.
J Psychopharmacol. 2003 Dec;17(4):355-64.
Death and dependence: current controversies over the selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors.
Nutt DJ.
Source
University of Bristol, Psychopharmacology Unit, School of Medical Sciences, University Walk, Bristol, UK.
[email protected]
Abstract
Recent years have seen a considerable media interest in the adverse effects of the selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs). This has led to claims that these antidepressants may lead to suicide and homicide and that they cause dependence or even addiction. Such claims have caused great concerns to many patients and have confused doctors in both primary care and psychiatric practice. In this article I review the basis of these claims and show that many seem to emerge from the misinterpretation of evidence and the use of imprecise definitions. Although the SSRIs are not free of problems they compare very favourably with other antidepressants and other classes of psychotropic drugs. There is no evidence they are addictive in the formal sense of leading to a drug dependence syndrome. Some suggestions on the way these issues can be more precisely defined and studied in future are given.
Comment in
Death, dependence and deception. [J Psychopharmacol. 2004]
PMID: 14870946 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]
Forensic Sci Int. 1994 Feb;64(2-3):107-17.
Fluoxetine and violent death in Maryland.
Frankenfield DL, Baker SP, Lange WR, Caplan YH, Smialek JE.
Source
Johns Hopkins University, School of Public Health, Baltimore, MD.
Abstract
A retrospective Medical Examiner case review of all deaths in Maryland where either fluoxetine or tricyclic antidepressant (TCA) use was forensically detected was conducted for the time period January 1987-July 1991. Case records and toxicology reports from the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner were reviewed to determine cause and manner of death, circumstances of death, demographic information on the decedent, prior medical history of the decedent, and presence and level of either fluoxetine or TCA in various body fluids/tissues. Suicide was the manner of death most frequently associated with TCA and fluoxetine detection. Violent methods were more often associated with fluoxetine suicides than with TCA suicides (65% v. 23%, P < 0.001). Demographic characteristics of antidepressant-related deaths in Maryland were similar to those of the entire USA. Possible explanations for the results obtained include the inherent lower lethality of fluoxetine compared to the TCAs, necessitating the use of additional means to complete the act of suicide; that physicians may have switched more impulsive, high risk patients to this new agent as it became available, thus creating a selection bias for more violence-prone individuals in the fluoxetine group; or that fluoxetine may be associated with induction of violence and/or suicidal ideation. Further research examining the possible association of these agents with violent acts is warranted.
PMID: 8175081 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]
JAMA. 2001 Dec 5;286(21):2695-702.
School-associated violent deaths in the United States, 1994-1999.
Anderson M, Kaufman J, Simon TR, Barrios L, Paulozzi L, Ryan G, Hammond R, Modzeleski W, Feucht T, Potter L; School-Associated Violent Deaths Study Group.
Source
Division of Violence Prevention, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Mailstop K-60, 4770 Buford Hwy NE, Atlanta, GA 30341, USA.
[email protected]
Abstract
CONTEXT:
Despite the public alarm following a series of high-profile school shootings that occurred in the United States during the late 1990s, little is known about the actual incidence and characteristics of school-associated violent deaths.
OBJECTIVE:
To describe recent trends and features of school-associated violent deaths in the United States.
DESIGN, SETTING, AND SUBJECTS:
Population-based surveillance study of data collected from media databases, state and local agencies, and police and school officials for July 1, 1994, through June 30, 1999. A case was defined as a homicide, suicide, legal intervention, or unintentional firearm-related death of a student or nonstudent in which the fatal injury occurred (1) on the campus of a public or private elementary or secondary school, (2) while the victim was on the way to or from such a school, or (3) while the victim was attending or traveling to or from an official school-sponsored event.
MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES:
National estimates of risk of school-associated violent death; national trends in school-associated violent deaths; common features of these events; and potential risk factors for perpetration and victimization.
RESULTS:
Between 1994 and 1999, 220 events resulting in 253 deaths were identified; 202 events involved 1 death and 18 involved multiple deaths (median, 2 deaths per multiple-victim event). Of the 220 events, 172 were homicides, 30 were suicides, 11 were homicide-suicides, 5 were legal intervention deaths, and 2 were unintentional firearm-related deaths. Students accounted for 172 (68.0%) of these deaths, resulting in an estimated average annual incidence of 0.068 per 100 000 students. Between 1992 and 1999, the rate of single-victim student homicides decreased significantly (P =.03); however, homicide rates for students killed in multiple-victim events increased (P =.047). Most events occurred around the start of the school day, the lunch period, or the end of the school day. For 120 (54.5%) of the incidents, respondents reported that a note, threat, or other action potentially indicating risk for violence occurred prior to the event. Homicide offenders were more likely than homicide victims to have expressed some form of suicidal behavior prior to the event (odds ratio [OR], 6.96; 95% confidence interval [CI], 1.96-24.65) and been bullied by their peers (OR, 2.57; 95% CI, 1.12-5.92).
CONCLUSIONS:
Although school-associated violent deaths remain rare events, they have occurred often enough to allow for the detection of patterns and the identification of potential risk factors. This information may help schools respond to this problem.
Comment in
Risk factors for violent death in children. [JAMA. 2002]
Risk factors for violent death in children. [JAMA. 2002]
PMID: 11730445 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]
Am J Psychiatry. 1992 Apr;149(4):572.
Media coverage versus fluoxetine as the cause of suicidal ideation.
Ioannou C.
Comment in
Media- or fluoxetine-induced akathisia? [Am J Psychiatry. 1993]
Media- or fluoxetine-induced akathisia? [Am J Psychiatry. 1993]
Comment on
Emergence of intense suicidal preoccupation during fluoxetine treatment. [Am J Psychiatry. 1990]
PMID: 1554048 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE
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