Compendium of Psychopharmacotherapy [antikvár]

PREFACE TO THE FOURTH EDITION As long as tranquilizers have existed, critical voices have warned against prescribing psychotropic drugs indiscriminately. There is certainly more than a grain of truth in this. On the other hand, the problem for the medical practitioner is that there is an ever greater and more complex range of these now indispensable agents and their action is increasingly specific and differentiated. In the preface to an earlier edition of the Compendium of Psychopharmaco- therapy Professor Kielholz wrote: 'In its first edition, this compendium sought to illuminate the problems confronting the non-psychiatrist and help him familiarize himself with the great number of drugs at his dis- posal and select the right one for the individual case.' I have nothing new to add to these words, but would merely like to stress them. How- ever, the expansion, transformation and increased sophistication of the subject over the past decade have revealed the urgency of adapting this monograph for the revised edition planned by Editiones . In our field, specific clinical pharmacotherapy is unthinkable without neurophysiology and neuropharmacology. Professor Willy Haefely, M.D., of Basle, has kindly accepted the task of clearly and concisely formulating the most recent findings from his field of research in a special chapter which is the actual crystallization point of the revised Compendium. I am indebted to François Wider of Sarnen - author of the standard work Psychoactive Drugs - for the updated drug table. Wolfgang Kolditz, M.D., of Basle, took in hand the task of editing and, together with myself, defined the priorities for a modern approach. We have omitted historical passages, digressions on psychostimulants, outdated biochemical (in part, still theoretical) expositions and speculative polem- ics on the misuse of psychotropics to make as much space as possible available for practical problems: alcohol and its interaction with other medication, the danger of suicide, selective use or avoidance of specific side effects, behaviour in traffic. I am also indebted to my colleague W. Kolditz for recasting the bibliography in a more convenient form at