After the acute phase treatment , as long as the drug was continued , the superiority of the combination over either monotherapy appeared to persist .
BACKGROUND Panic disorder can be treated with pharmacotherapy , psychotherapy or in combination , but the relative merits of combined therapy have not been well established .
OBJECTIVES To review evidence concerning short- and long-term advantages and disadvantages of combined psychotherapy plus antidepressant treatment for panic disorder with or without agoraphobia , in comparison with either therapy alone .
Pharmacological treatment of agoraphobia: imipramine versus imipramine with programmed practice.
Eighteen agoraphobic patients with r and omly assigned to 12 week treatment with imipramine ( I ) or imipramine and programmed in-vivo exposure practice ( I+BT ) to investigate the contribution of behavioural instructions to the clinical effects of pharmacotherapy . Significantly greater improvement on phobic measures was found in the I+BT group compared to the I group . Differences were less marked on measures of panic and anxiety . The results suggest that imipramine possesses an antiphobic effect which can be substantially enhanced with programmed practice . Controlled large-scale investigations of the pharmacological and instructional effects of the phamacotherapy of agoraphobia are needed for a definitive evaluation of the specific antiphobic effect of antidepressant drugs
After the acute phase treatment , as long as the drug was continued , the superiority of the combination over either monotherapy appeared to persist .
BACKGROUND Panic disorder can be treated with pharmacotherapy , psychotherapy or in combination , but the relative merits of combined therapy have not been well established .
OBJECTIVES To review evidence concerning short- and long-term advantages and disadvantages of combined psychotherapy plus antidepressant treatment for panic disorder with or without agoraphobia , in comparison with either therapy alone .