Hypertensive Interactions Between Monoamine Oxidase Inhibitors and Foodstuffs

Hypertensive attacks during treatment with amine oxidase inhibitors were first described in tuberculous patients, and were “rediscovered'’ when these drugs were introduced into psychiatry. In an assessment of iproniazid for tuberculosis (Ogilvie, 1955), 4 out of 42 patients experienced “attacks of a most distressing nature”, with severe throbbing occipital headache and high blood pressure. Six years later, similar attacks were observed in 5 out of 212 patients treated for depression with nialamide (Davies, 1959), but it was not until the introduction of tranylcypromine that reports again appeared (Lurie and Salzer, 1961; Clark, 1961). By the beginning of 1963, over 40 such cases had been reported, including several complicated by intracerebral haemorrhage or cardiac failure due to the rise in blood pressure (Songco, 1961; McClure, 1962; Dorrell, 1963).