Comparative study of the effects of bupropion and escitalopram on Internet gaming disorder.

AIM: We compared the efficacy of bupropion and escitalopram treatments in Internet gaming disorder (IGD) patients. METHODS: We recruited 119 adolescents and adults with IGD. We treated these participants for 6 weeks in three groups as follows: 44 participants were treated with bupropion SR (bupropion group), 42 participants were treated with escitalopram (escitalopram group), and 33 patients without any medication were observed in the community (observation group). At baseline and at the 6-week follow-up visit, all subjects were evaluated using the Clinical Global Impression-Severity Scale, the Young Internet Addiction Scale, the Beck Depression Inventory, the ADHD Rating Scale, and the Behavioral Inhibition and Activation Scales. RESULTS: Both the escitalopram group and the bupropion group showed improvement on all clinical symptom scales after 6 weeks of treatment compared to the observation group. Additionally, the bupropion group showed greater improvement on scores for the Clinical Global Impression-Severity Scale, the Young Internet Addiction Scale, the ADHD Rating Scale, and the Behavioral Inhibition Scale than the escitalopram group. CONCLUSION: Both bupropion and escitalopram were effective in treating and managing IGD symptoms. Moreover, bupropion appeared to be more effective than escitalopram in improving attention and impulsivity in IGD patients. In addition, attention and impulsivity seem to be important for the management of IGD.

Differences in gray matter volume corresponding to delusion and hallucination in patients with schizophrenia compared with patients who have bipolar disorder.

BACKGROUND: Although schizophrenia and bipolar disorder (BD) are classified as different disease entities, they share critical pathognomonic symptoms in terms of hallucination and delusion. Because the characteristics of clinical symptoms are not sufficient to differentiate schizophrenia from BD, several studies have applied brain imaging methods to provide biological evidence of differences. We compared gray matter (GM) volume differences in schizophrenia and BD patients and examined volumetric differences associated with hallucination and delusion in these two groups. METHODS: Ninety-three schizophrenia patients and 75 BD patients who were followed for at least 3 years in an outpatient department were recruited for this study. Magnetic resonance data from 71 schizophrenia patients and 44 BD patients were obtained using a 3.0 T scanner. Volumetric differences were analyzed using Matlab 8.0.0 and SPM8 software. RESULTS: The results showed that delusion symptoms were negatively correlated with GM volume within both frontal and both temporal cortices in the schizophrenia group and were negatively correlated with GM volume within the bilateral frontal cortices in the BD group. Hallucination symptoms were negatively correlated with GM volume within the bilateral frontal, bilateral temporal, and left parietal cortices in the schizophrenia group and were negatively correlated with GM volume within the bilateral frontal, right parietal, occipital, and insular cortices in the BD group. CONCLUSION: Delusions in schizophrenia were correlated with GM volume in multiple brain regions, including the frontal, temporal, and parietal cortices, compared to those in patients with BD. Hallucination was associated with temporal lobe GM volume in patients with schizophrenia and with insular cortex GM volume in patients with BD.