Ziprasidone in the Treatment of Borderline Personality Disorder

The American Psychiatric Association (APA) Guidelines for the Treatment of Borderline personality disorder recommend that pharmacological treatment for BPD has an important adjunctive role, especially for diminution of symptoms such as affective instability, impulsivity, psychotic-like symptoms, and self-destructive behavior. Studies conducted with low doses of conventional antipsychotics have showed significant improvements in specific symptoms such as hostility, impulsiveness, mood, and psychotic symptoms.

The introduction of atypical antipsychotics, with a more favorable tolerance profile, increases clinicians' options for treating BPD. Olanzapine has proven its efficacy in four double-blind, placebo-controlled clinical trials in patients with BPD. Ziprasidone is an atypical antipsychotic with a pharmacological action on serotonergic, dopaminergic and adrenergic receptors. It has proven to be effective for schizophrenia, schizoaffective and acute mania disorders and the incidence of side effects is low.

Although clinical findings and the pharmacological activity of ziprasidone suggest the drug may have therapeutic benefits in BPD patients, no controlled studies have yet been conducted in these patients. We carried out a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled study to evaluate efficacy and tolerability of ziprasidone in the management of BPD patients with moderate-high clinical severity.

Inclusion criteria

• DSM-IV diagnosis of Borderline Personality Disorder
• Age between 18 and 45 years
• Clinical Global Impression of Severity (CGI-S)scores >4

Exclusion criteria

• No comorbidity with schizophrenia, drug-induced psychosis, organic brain syndrome, alcohol or other substance dependence, bipolar disorder, mental retardation, or major depressive episode in course
• current use of medically accepted contraception in the case of female patients.