Implications of Psychopharmacology to Psychiatry

The discovery of chlorpromazine for the specific treatment of schizophrenic symp­ toms and, later on, of imipramine for the specific treatment of depressive symptoms marked a new milestone in clinical psychiatry and basic neuroscience 40 years ago. The exploration of biochemical mechanisms of action of these psychotropic drugs created new theories on the pathophysiology of psychiatric disorders, such as the dopamine hypothesis of schizophrenia and the catecholamine and serotonin hypotheses of de