Do Antidepressants Induce Rapid Cycling? A Gender-Specific Association.

Objective: To investigate the influence of antidepressant use and gender in the genesis of rapid-cycling bipolar illness.

Method: The charts of bipolar patients treated at the Massachusetts General Hospital Bipolar Clinic (Boston, Mass.) were reviewed for gender, presence or absence of rapid cycling, and antidepressant use prior to first mania.

Results: Data were obtained for 129 bipolar patients (55% women), 45% of whom had experienced a rapid-cycling course. Overall, there was no significant difference in the rates of rapid cycling between the subjects who were exposed to antidepressants prior to their first manic/hypomanic episode and those who were not. Additional analysis carried out separately by gender found a significant association between rapid cycling and antidepressant use prior to first mania/hypomania for women but not for men. A logistic regression analysis with rapid cycling as dependent variable revealed a significant interaction between antidepressant use prior to first mania/hypomania and gender.

Conclusion: We found a gender-specific relationship between antidepressant use prior to first manic/hypomanic episode and rapid-cycling bipolar illness. When antidepressants are prescribed to depressed women who have a risk of bipolar disorder, the risk of inducing rapid cycling should be considered. Differing proportions of women and men in previous studies may account for conflicting results reported in the literature for the relationship of antidepressants and rapid cycling. However, this naturalistic trial was uncontrolled, and controlled research is required to confirm our findings.