Rodriguez-Cerdeira et al J Clin Med Res • page no. to be assigned Table 3. Cumulative Proportion of Responders at Weeks 2, 4, 6, 8, 12,16, 20 and 24 During Treatment With Amisulpride (NP = 20) Number of patients Time Week 2 Week 4 Week 6 Week 8 Week 12 Week 16 Week 20 Week 24 6 8 17 20 20 20 20 20 NP: Number of the patients. A comparative qualitative evaluation of treatment re- sponse was also performed by calculating the percentage of responses in each group. The software used for the analysis was the Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS), version 18.0.1) (SPSS Inc, Chicago, IL). Results Twenty-two patients were recruited and assigned to receive amisulpride. One patient was excluded for the lack of com- pliance and another refused to continue the study because of side effects. Ultimately, 20 patients were included. A summa- ry of demographic information, including gender, index age, age at onset of BMS, and illness duration is shown in Table 1. These variables did not differ significantly with respect to the total scores at baseline (VAS, HAM-A, HAM-D, and CGI-EI). The amisulpride treatment regimen resulted in a sig- nificant improvement in BMS from the baseline at week 6 (Table 2), as demonstrated by VAS total scores at the end of the study. A large improvement was also observed in the final HMA-D and HMA-A total scores from baseline to the end of week 8 (Table 3). Both the severity of illness (CGI-S) and improvement (CGI-EI) scales showed steady improve- ment over 8 weeks. The mean ± SD CGI-EI scores were 4.2 ± 1.2 at baseline and 2.5 ± 0.9 at week 8 and remained more or less constant until week 24. VAS, HAM-A, and HAM-D mean scores decreased sig- Articles © The authors | Journal compilation © J Clin Med Res and Elmer Press™ | www.jocmr.org % 30 43 85 100 100 100 100 100 Table 4. Side Effects Nausea/dyspepsia Sedation Dry mouth Constipation Insomnia Anxiety Tremor Asthenia Headache No side effects Number of patients = 20. Number 1 1 0 0 4 2 3 0 3 6 % 0 0 7 13 13 20 7 0 13 40 nificantly from baseline to week 2 (Table 2), indicating the speed of action of amisulpride. These scales also show that this improvement increased significantly until week 6. The percentage of response at week 8 was 100% (Table 3) and remained at this level through week 24. No serious adverse effects were reported. However, the most frequently encoun- tered side effects were as follows: insomnia in 4 patients, tremor in 3 patients, headache in 2 patients, nausea/dyspep- sia and sedation in other patient. The occurrence of these side effects is shown in Table 4. Discussion We carried out a review of the articles and clinical case stud- ies published in the literature between 2001 and 2011, de- scribing different pharmacological options for the treatment of BMS. To our knowledge, this is the first systematic study of amisulpride in the treatment of BMS by using established diagnostic criteria and rating scales over a long period. The data relating to the efficacy and safety of each of the drugs used in the different studies have been reviewed. However, the clinical trials conducted to date are not par¬ticularly ro- bust. Most of them are open-label uncontrolled studies in- volving small patient groups and short time periods. Further- more, the expression of results is heterogeneous [6, 7]. Although effective therapies have been identified in specific cases, a treatment modality that offers efficacy in most cases of BMS has not yet been established. Further in-