Cognitive modulation of the endocrine stress response to a pharmacological challenge in normal and panic disorder subjects.

What Was Tested

The paper reports a study of Pentagastrin, published as a randomized controlled trial.

To determine whether cognitive manipulation can alter HPA axis activity in laboratory studies and whether patients with panic disorder are differentially sensitive to the manipulated factors.

Why It Was Studied

The hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis may mediate the deleterious effects of stress on health.

It is sensitive to cognitive and emotional aspects of organism-environment interactions, such as familiarity, control, and social support.

Who Took Part

By PubMed's age tags, the people studied were adults, both men and women.

Recruited from university clinic and newspaper advertisements.

Fourteen patients with panic disorder and 14 controls, individually matched for age and sex.

How the Study Was Run

In design terms this was a randomized study.

Because people in this Pentagastrin study were split into groups at random, differences between the groups are less likely to reflect who happened to join each one.

What Was Measured

The subject headings attached to it are Adaptation, Psychological, Adrenocorticotropic Hormone, Anxiety Disorders, Cognition, Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, Exploratory Behavior and Hydrocortisone.

What This Means in Plain Language

The paper is a randomized study of Pentagastrin.

The abstract goes on to report its results in about 7 sentences; this page does not restate them, so read the paper for the findings and their limits.

The publication is from 2005 (Archives of general psychiatry), a journal based in United States.

More context: all human trials.