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Lake and Spiegel note that people with unipolar and bipolar depression have “markedly
low levels” of inositol. They assert that, “many small well-designed studies have
provided promising evidence to support inositol’s therapeutic efficacy in the same
spectrum of psychiatric disorders that respond to SSRIs, including depression, panic
disorder, and obsessive-compulsive disorder.”^3 As their principal source, they cite
Levine’s 1997 review of 8 controlled studies, which is augmented by his discussion in
Mischoulon and Rosenbaum.
Although none of the other originally consulted sources even mentions inositol,
Mischoulon and Rosenbaum dedicate an entire chapter to it, authored by Robert H.
Belmaker and Joseph Levine,^4 who describe their investigation of the use of inositol to
treat a range of psychiatric disorders, including small studies of depression (alone and
in combination with other antidepressant drugs), panic disorder, obsessive-compulsive
disorder, bulimia and binge eating.^5 The depression study is the most robust, but the
panic disorder results are also significant. The remaining observations are promising.
In the 1995 Levine et al. depression study,^6 treatment with inositol resulted in
significantly greater improvement in HAM-D scores at four weeks compared to
placebo, 33% improvement with inositol vs. 12% with placebo. (p=.04). The
significance of this result is limited by the size of the study (27 subjects) and the four-
week duration.^7 There were no significant results at two weeks.
The 2006 Nierenberg, et al. depression study was more convincing, comparing HAM-D
scores with randomized administration of lamotrigine (Lamictal, an anti-seizure
medication), resperidone (Risperdal), as active placebo, and inositol. The rate of
recovery was 23.8% with lamotrigine, 17.4% with inositol, and 4.6% with resperidone.^8
In comparison with fluoxetine (Prozac), an SSRI, a double-blind, random-order,
crossover study of panic disorder showed a greater reduction in the number of panic
attacks with inositol in the first week, and similar results over the nine-week course.
Attacks fell from ten to six on placebo and from ten to three and a half on inositol. Ten
of 21 subjects responded to inositol, 3 to placebo.^9 10