Introductory Remarks to the 1982 IPEG meeting in Hannover

B. SCHNIEDERS

The scientific symposium on electroencephalography in drug research was one of a series of symposia staged by the Institute for Drugs of the Federal Health Office to allow experts to discuss and define the "present-day state of knowledge" in various fields of medicine as demanded by the law governing the use of drugs. The theme of this symposium, the titles of the workshops, and the individual papers suggest that, in addition to exchanging information, we shall indeed document present-day state of our knowledge of the role played by electroencephalography in drug research.

Electroencephalography has been used in clinical pharmacology since 1929 and the years following when H. Berger furnished proof that cerebral potentials accompany human brain activity. As early as 1933 Berger described EEG changes brought about under the effect of barbiturates, morphine, cocaine and scopolamine. In the 1950's and 1960's a series of papers appeared describing the effects of various drugs on human EEG (Bente, 1956, 1961; Bente and Itil, 1954, 1955, 1957; Fink, 1959, 1961, 1963; Itil, 1960, 1961, 1968; Goldstein et al., 1963; Bornstein et al., 1965). Some of the pioneers of electroencephalography in drug research participated actively in the symposium and contributed to this volume.

As this demonstrates, EEG in clinical pharmacology is still a relatively young field. Although quantitative methods of evaluating the EEG were described as early as the 1930's, many years were, in fact, required before such methods became so practicable that this technique did not remain the domain of only a few laboratories in the world. Many more laboratories now have the necessary facilities at their disposal. If electroencephalography is to assume a more important role in clinical pharmacology, much more equipment and trained scientists must be made available. However, it is of even greater importance that universally valid criteria be established for quantitative analysis of the EEG and a convention be established defining the methods by which the EEG is to be interpreted. Now, less than two years after the Symposium, Guidelines for Research in Pharmaco-electroencephalography in Humans have been established by an expert group and are published in this book in both the original German version as well as an authorized English translation.

Since computers for quantitative analysis of EEG data are no longer prohibitively expensive - no more expensive in fact than the EEG unit itself - and more and more scientists have come to realize that EEG constitutes an extremely useful tool, without which pharmacological research would be inconceivable, future developments will proceed at an even faster pace than before. Taking this into consideration, it seems to be all the more necessary to define the state-of-the-art and to discuss both the possibilities and limits of EEG in clinical pharmacological research. EEG is well accepted as a tool for describing the effects of psychotropic drugs. It also has been used successfully for revealing and describing the undesirable effects of drugs - including those which are not primarily psychotropic - on the central nervous system.

A further important field of application, which, in fact, was also discussed in our symposium, involves its use in clinical pharmacology. Until now we have been accustomed to describing bioavailability in terms of the existence of substances and their metabolites in the blood circulation, their actual and theoretical distribution in the organism and their excretion. Frequently, however, it is impossible to obtain a sufficiently clear picture of metabolism, so that we must ask whether, in the case of certain substances - especially those which are centrally active, it might be useful to describe the dynamics of an effect parameter. This should become a major future use of quantitative EEG in pharmacological research. Routines should be developed to such a degree of sophistication that a clear description of the effect of certain drugs is possible.

It is interesting to note that our American colleagues of the College of Neuropsychopharmacology attached significance to the aspect of effect kinetics in the Final Task Force Report on Bioavailability and Bioequivalence of Psychotropic Drugs. Finally, I would like to express the hope that our symposium and this book will document our interest in, and contribute to, defining the state-of-the-art and in discussing the possibilities and the limits of EEG in drug research.

Berlin, June 27, 1980