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Comparative amnesic and sedative effects of lorazepam and oxazepam in healthy volunteers

Clinical Psychopharmacology, Institute of Psychiatry, De Crespigny Park, Denmark Hill, London SE5 8AF, UK

Clarice Gorenstein

Department of Pharmacology, Institute of Biomedical Sciences, University of Sao Paulo, Brazil

Malcolm Lader

Clinical Psychopharmacology, Institute of Psychiatry, De Crespigny Park, Denmark Hill, London SE5 8AF, UK

Oxazepam and its chlorinated derivative, lorazepam, have similar half-lives but differing potencies. This study compared the effects of these two benzodiazepines with a placebo on memory, mood and psychomotor function. Thirty six volunteers took part in a double-blind, independent groups design. Subjects completed a battery of tests before and 2.5 h after drug administration. Lorazepam 2 mg produced more profound subjective and motor sedation than oxazepam 30 mg, and this in turn produced a similar, global pattern of impairments across a wide range of tasks. However, lorazepam produced greater decrements than oxazepam on a task involving episodic memory even when sedative effects were partialled out. We suggest that this finding may reflect either differential task sensitivities or a contribution of priming to performance on the explicit memory task.

Key Words: working memory • episodic memory • psychomotor function • sedation • oxazepam • lorazepam

Journal of Psychopharmacology, Vol. 7, No. 3, 249-256 (1993)
DOI: 10.1177/026988119300700303


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