TABLE 1.
Studies investigating efficacy and/or side effects of ESC treatment, sorted by relevance.
| References | Study design and subjects | PD comed.* | ST score | TDM score | BL/antidepressant effect relationship | BL/side effect relationship | Comment |
| Florio et al. (11) | pCS with flexible doses (mean 15 mg/d); MDD; N: 70 | No | 5/10 | 9/10 | + (HAMD-21A) | N/A | Focus on BL/effect-relationship. |
| Hodgson et al. (14) | RCT with flexible doses (mean 16 mg/d); UD; N: 266 (2014), 340 (2015) | No | High risk | 8/10 | – at high BL/ Ø for dose-corrected BL (MADRS) |
–dry mouth (ASEC) | Focus on genotyping. |
| Yasui-Furukori et al. (20) | pCS with fixed doses (mean 5 mg/d); ADS; N: 25 | No | 6/10 | 7/10 | N/A | –(DESS) | No value for TRR (ADS was investigated). |
| Kuo et al. (12) | pCS with flexible doses (mean 10 mg/d); MDD; N: 158 | No | 8/10 | 9/10 | Ø (HAM-D, HAM-A, CGI-S, CGI-I) |
± dry mouth, fatigue, nausea (TESS) | Focus on genotyping. Correlation between CYP1A2 SNPs and ADRs. No direct correlation of ADRs with BL. |
| Tadic et al. (13) | RCT with fixed doses (mean 19 mg/d); MDD; N: 889 | No | some concerns | 8/10 | Ø (HAMD-17) |
Ø (ADR frequency) |
|
| Leuchter et al. (17) | RCT with fixed doses (mean 10 mg/d); MDD; N: 73 | No | high risk | 6/10 | Ø (HAMD-17) |
N/A |
PD Comed., Concomitant psychotropic medication with antidepressant efficacy; QA, quality assessment; pCS, prospective cohort study; N/A, not available; Ø, not found; +, positive correlation; –, negative correlation; BL, blood level; TRR, therapeutic reference range; MDD, major depressive disorder; UD, unipolar depression; ADS, antidepressants discontinuation syndrome; N, Subjects treated with ESC, *except for benzodiazepines.