Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, May 26, 1995 TAG: 9505260095
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: MIAMI BEACH, FLA. LENGTH: Medium
It's the first formal study of medication for the condition, which has no standard treatment, experts say.
Compulsive shopping or buying affects approximately 1 percent to 6 percent of the American population. Truly serious cases probably appear in less than 1 percent, said psychiatrist Donald Black.
The problem appears to be more common in women, who mostly buy clothing, shoes and makeup, than in men, who tend to purchase electronic gear and clothes, Black said.
``Most of my patients are thinking about buying all the time,'' Black said. ``They kind of arrange their lives around shopping.''
But their euphoria in the store is followed by guilt and disgust when they think about what they've done, he said. The urge to shop can be so powerful that people go bankrupt or lose their job because they were too busy shopping to show up on time, he said.
Black, an associate professor of psychiatry at the University of Iowa School of Medicine in Iowa City, presented results of the treatment study at the annual meeting of the American Psychiatric Association.
He found that of the 10 compulsive shoppers in the study, nine cut their shopping at least in half after they started taking fluvoxamine twice a day.
Fluvoxamine is most commonly used in the United States to treat obsessive-compulsive disorder, a condition marked by intrusive thoughts and irresistible rituals such as hand-washing.
The study was sponsored by two pharmaceutical companies that jointly market the drug in the United States, Solvay Pharmaceuticals of Marietta, Ga., and The Upjohn Co. of Kalamazoo, Mich.
After a few days to a few weeks on the drug, the patients were shopping less often and spending less money, starting to pay off debts and having fewer arguments with their spouses, which had frequently been triggered by the shopping bills, Black said.
Moreover, ``if they had an urge to shop, they could use willpower to control themselves, whereas before ... it just wouldn't work,'' Black said.
One man, who had been basically living off his wife's income while spending nearly all his take-home pay on clothes, cut his purchases to $200 a month from $800 a month.
Dr. Gary Christenson, an assistant psychiatry professor at the University of Minnesota who wasn't involved with the study, called it exciting because of the lack of a standard treatment.
``This is an impressive first study'' that should be followed up, he said.
Christenson said researchers now need to compare the effect of the medication to that of placebo pills, without the patient knowing which kind of pill is being used. That would show whether any effect of the drug is biological or just a psychological reaction to being treated.
Black said such a study is scheduled to begin within six months.
by CNB