This study investigated whether brief training in cognitive therapy for panic disorder (Clark et al., 1994) can improve the outcomes that primary care therapists obtain with their patients. Seven primary care therapists treated 36 patients meeting DSM-IV (APA, 1994) criteria for panic disorder with or without agoraphobia in general practice surgeries. Outcomes for the cohort of patients whom th...

BACKGROUND The learning perspective of panic disorder distinguishes between acute panic and anxious apprehension as distinct emotional states. Following animal models, these clinical entities reflect different stages of defensive reactivity depending upon the imminence of interoceptive or exteroceptive threat cues. The current study tested this model by investigating the dynamics of defensive r...

BACKGROUND Cognitive model of panic disorder have proposed that panic attacks result from the catastrophic misinterpretation of certain bodily sensations. Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy (CBT) for panic disorder aims to change these catastrophic cognitions. CBT intervention successfully caused reduction of catastrophic cognitions and symptomatic improvement in the majority of cases. However there ...

Panic disorder is associated with considerable disability and economic costs. A first aim of the present study was to compare level of functioning and economic costs in subthreshold and mild panic disorder with or without agoraphobia. A second aim was to investigate whether pre-treatment levels of severity of panic and agoraphobia predicted improvement after an early intervention for panic symp...

Panic disorder is a recurrent and disabling illness. It is believed that Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) has a long-term protective effect for this disorder. This would offer CBT considerable advantage over medication management of panic disorder, as patients often relapse when they are tapered off their medications. This is a review of the literature about the long-term effectiveness of CBT...

AIMS The posterior region of the orbitofrontal cortex (OFC), which forms its sulcogyral pattern during neurodevelopment, receives multisensory inputs. The purpose of the present study was to assess the relationship between posterior OFC sulcogyral pattern and OFC volume difference in patients with panic disorder. METHODS The anatomical pattern of the posterior orbital sulcus (POS) was classif...

OBJECTIVE Low serum phosphate level is considered one of the metabolic adaptations to the respiratory alkalosis induced by hyperventilation associated with panic disorder. The aim of this study was to assess phosphatemia as a possible state marker for panic disorder. METHODS Sixteen panic disorder patients underwent clinical assessment with a semi-structured interview, a set of rating scales ...

OBJECTIVE The aim of this study is to evaluate the association between childhood trauma and the quality of parental bonding in panic disorder compared to non-clinical controls. METHOD 123 patients and 123 paired controls were evaluated with the Mini International Neuropsychiatric Interview, the Childhood Trauma Questionnaire and the Parental Bonding Instrument. RESULTS The Parental Bonding ...

BACKGROUND We have previously reported that 35% CO2 challenge induced myocardial ischemia in 81% of coronary artery disease (CAD) patients with comorbid panic disorder (PD) and previous positive nuclear exercise stress tests. However, it is yet unclear whether this is the case among CAD patients with PD and normal nuclear exercise stress test results. We hypothesized that a potent mental stress...