The effect of ranitidine on olanzapine-induced weight gain.

Induced weight gain is a disturbing side effect of Olanzapine that affects the quality of life in psychotic patients. The aim of this study was to assess the efficacy of Ranitidine in attenuating or preventing Olanzapine-induced weight gain. A parallel 2-arm clinical trial was done on 52 patients with schizophrenia, schizoaffective and schizophreniform disorders who received Olanzapine for the first time. All these were first-episode admitted patients. They were randomly allocated to receive either Ranitidine or placebo. The trend of body mass index (BMI) was compared between groups over 16-week course of treatment. Mean weight was 62.3 (SD: 9.6) kg at baseline. Thirty-three subjects (63.5%) had positive family history of obesity. The average BMI increment was 1.1 for Ranitidine group and 2.4 for the placebo group. The multivariate analysis showed this effect to be independent of sex, family history of obesity, and baseline BMI value. The longitudinal modeling after controlling for baseline values failed to show the whole trend slope to be different. Although the slight change in trend's slope puts forward a hypothesis that combined use of Ranitidine and Olanzapine may attenuate the weight gain long run, this needs to be retested in future larger scale long-term studies. This trial is registered with IRCT.ir 201009112181N5.

Factors related to marital satisfaction in women with major depressive disorder.

OBJECTIVE: Major depressive disorder (MDD) is one of the most common psychiatric disorders which affects married couples frequently.The present study aims to explain the role of family processes, social support and demographic factors in marital satisfaction of women with Major Depressive Disorder (MDD). METHOD: In this cross-sectional study, 188 women with MDD were randomly selected among the patients who visited Bozorgmehr Clinic of Tabriz University of Medical Sciences. The sample selection was carried out through structured psychiatric interviews based on DSM-TV-TR criteria. Data were collected using Index of Marital Satisfaction (IMS), Family Process Scale (FPS) and Norbeck Social Support Questionnaire (NSSQ).The Mann Whitney U, Multivariate and ANOVA tests were used to analyze the data. RESULTS: No relationship was observed between age, educational level, age difference of couples and number of children with family processes and marital satisfaction (p ≥ 0.05). The patients with low educational level reported less social support (p ≥ 0.05).Marital satisfaction and family coherence were lower when the husband had a psychiatric disorder (P ≤ 0.01). The family processes (family coherence, problem-solving skills, communication skills and religious beliefs) and social support positively predicted marital satisfaction, while the husband's psychiatric disorders negatively predicted marital satisfaction. CONCLUSION: The findings highlight the significance of family processes, social support and husband's psychiatric disorders in marital satisfaction of women with MDD.