Clarifying the Safety of the MAOI Diet and Pizza

Letter to the Editor

Sir: We appreciated Drs. Shulman and Walker’s study attemptingto clarify and extend our clinical experience demonstratingthe apparent safety of ingesting at least some types ofpizza along with a monoamine oxidase inhibitor (MAOI). Theirstudies clarifying the specifics of the MAOI diet have been aninvaluable aid to all clinicians who prescribe these important antidepressantmedications.

Our premise in noting the safety of MAOI-treated patients’ ingesting kosher pizza was based on the fact that kosher pizzaestablishments do not generally use aged cheeses as a topping.