UPI: Panic attacks may be predictable

The wire service UPI has covered the research of SMU psychologist Dr. Alicia Meuret showing panic attacks that seem to strike out-of-the-blue are not without warning after all.

Meuret’s study found significant physiological instability one hour before patients reported feeling a panic attack. The findings suggest potentially new treatments for panic, and re-examination of other “unexpected” medical problems, including seizures, strokes and manic episodes, says Meuret, an assistant professor in the SMU Department of Psychology. She was lead researcher on the study. Dr. David Rosenfield, an associate professor in SMU’s Department of Psychology, was lead statistician.

They reported the results in the journal Biological Psychiatry in the article “Do Unexpected Panic Attacks Occur Spontaneously?“

Read the full wire story.

EXCERPT:

UPI
DALLAS, July 27 (UPI) — Panic attacks that seem to strike out-of-the-blue are not without warning after all, U.S. researchers say.

Lead researcher Alicia E. Meuret, a psychologist at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, says the study is based on 24-hour monitoring of panic sufferers while they went about their daily activities. Portable recorders captured changes in respiration, heart rate and other bodily functions, Meuret says.

The researchers captured panic attacks as they occurred and discovered waves of significant physiological instability for at least 60 minutes before patients’ awareness of the panic attacks, Meuret says.

Read the full wire story.