The results of the experimental administration of amphetamine sulphate in oligophrenia.

A NUMBERof drugs have been employed in an attempt to increase the mental capacity of oligophrenics. The effect of thiamine on learning demonstrated by Harrell (1943, 1946) led Rudolf (1949, 1950) to use this vitamin in the treatment of oligophrenia. Similarly, the early studies of Zimmermann and Ross (1944) on glutamic acid resulted in a large number of papers on its debatable effect in feeblemindedness (Zimmermann, Burgomeister and Putnam, 1946, 1947, 1948; McCulloch, 1950; Elison, Fuller and Urmston, 1950; Quinn and Durling, 1950;Lafon,Faureand Bascou,1952;Oldfelt, 1952).The results of celastrus paniculata on mental defectives have been described by us elsewhere (Morris, MacGillivray and Mathieson, 1953, 1954). Amphetamine (“benzedrine―, $-phenylisopropylamine) is a sympatho. mimetic amine resembling ephednne and adrenaline, but differing chiefly in its greater abilities to stimulate the higher centres of the nervous system and particularly the cerebral cortex. This mechanism of cerebral stimulation has not been fully elucidated. Blaschko (1940) suggested that the ability of the sympathomimetic amines to act as analeptics can be directly correlated with this ability to inhibit amine oxidase in vitro. Mann and Quastel (1940) found the respiration of brain tissue to be inhibited by certain amines such as tyramine and isoamyline which are oxidized to ammonia and their corresponding aldehydes by amine oxidase. The addition of benzedrine increases oxygen con sumption by the brain by binding amine oxidase so that toxic aldehydes cannot be liberated. However, amphetamine cannot increase the respiration of brain inhibited by anaesthetics or produce an increased oxygen consumption by normal brain tissue. It is doubtful whether the peripheral effects of amphetamine on adrenergic structures can be linked with the excitatory effects on the central nervous system. The effects of amphetamine on the central nervous system have been summarized by Wilson and Schild (1952) as follows. The diffident individual becomes more confident, with greater capacity to make decisions and his thought