Amantadine Hydrochloride Treatment of Tardive Dyskinesia

Abstract

To the Editor: In a recent letter to this journal, Vale and Espejel¹ reported that two patients with tardive dyskinesia and "extrapyramidal symptoms" dramatically responded to an antiviral agent, amantadine hydrochloride. "Tardive dyskinesias" are characterized by dysfunction of facial and lingual muscles (protrusions of the tongue and lip-smacking), dystonic trunk movements and choreoathetotic movements of the extremities. They occur in 20 per cent of psychiatric patients on long-term phenothiazine and butyrophenone medication and appear refractory to treatment with the standard anti-Parkinsonian medications and L-dopa. They frequently become worse when antipsychotic medication is discontinued. Although in some cases symptoms subside after . . .