Influence of Panic-Agoraphobic Spectrum Symptoms on Treatment Response in Patients With Recurrent Major Depression

OBJECTIVE: The authors tested the hypothesis that a lifetime history of panic-agoraphobic spectrum symptoms predicts a poorer response to depression treatment.METHOD: A threshold for clinically meaningful panic-agoraphobic spectrum symptoms was defined by means of receiver operating characteristic curve analysis of total scores on the Structured Clinical Interview for Panic-Agoraphobic Spectrum in a group of 88 outpatients with and without panic disorder. This threshold was then applied to a group of 61 women with recurrent major depression, who completed a self-report version of the same instrument, in order to compare treatment outcomes for patients above and below this clinical threshold.RESULTS: Women with high scores (≥35) on the Panic-Agoraphobic Spectrum Self-Report were less likely than women with low scores (