Psychophysiological probe of the limbic system: A possibility for a choice of specific antidepressant?

Four factors influence the choice of antidepressant in the treatment of depression: pharmacodynamics, pharmacokinetics and drug interactions, side effects, and financial aspect of treatment. Pharmacodynamic aspect of the choice of antidepressant is operationalized in practice using the information regarding the previous therapeutic response, family history of the therapeutic response in depression, and antidepressants which affect serotonergic neurotransmitter system are supposed to be particularly effective in depressed patients with panic attacks, obsessive-compulsive symptoms, irritability, anger, hostility, and impulsiveness. Despite these directions, our present method of choosing an antidepressant could be assigned as trial-error method. Psychophysiological probe of the neurochemistry of limbic system (through a system identification method) is an attempt to assess in a noninvasive way the functional interactions of monoamines in the limbic system. The method which is still to be examined and evaluated could be useful in the biochemical classification of depression and in prediction of response to a specific antidepressant.