Alec Coppen

Alec Coppen (born January 29 1923, in London, England is a British psychiatrist. He has been widely regarded as one of the pioneers of Biological Psychiatry and Psychopharmacology. He was given The Pioneers in Psychopharmacology Award in year 2000 by the Collegium Internationale Neuro Psychopharmacologicum.

He has received numerous awards, both in the UK and abroad. After army service in World War II, he studied medicine at Bristol University and at the Institute of Psychiatry in London. Later he was appointed to the Medical Research Councils Neuropsychiatric Research Unit in Epsom, Surrey, England. He is perhaps best known for the introduction of Serotonin theory of depression. He followed this by pursuing investigations into free and total tryptophan, post-mortem brain studies of depressed suicides and studies into the platelet transport of serotonin. It is fair to state the introduction of SSRI antidepressants is due to these studies. [cite journal | first = Alec | last = Coppen | title = The Biochemistry of Affective Disorders | journal = The British Journal of Psychiatry | date = 1967 | volume = 113 | pages = 1237–64 | publisher = Royal College of Psychiatrists]

He was very impressed by the early work of Mogens Schou in the use of lithium in the maintenance treatment of univocal and bipolar affective illness, and carried out the first prospective double blind treatment, which showed that lithium was very effective in the treatment of both conditions. [cite journal | first = Alec | last = Coppen | coauthors = et al. | title = Lithium and mortality: a fifteen year follow-up | journal = Clinical Neuropharmacology | date = 1992 | volume = 15 | pmid = 1498911]

He has worked on folic acid in depression since 1970, and has consistently found low plasma and red cell folate in patients suffering from severe depression. [cite journal | first = EH. | last = Reynolds | coauthors = et al. | title = Folate deficiency in depressive illness | journal = The British Journal of Psychiatry | date = 1970 | volume = 117 | pages = 287–92] He also showed that a folic acid supplement improved the prophylactic response to lithium. Antidepressant drugs are relatively weak therapeutic agents, only 60% of patients respond to an antidepressant compared with 40% on placebo. Combining fluoxetine with 0.5mg of folic acid 90% of women patients responded to treatment, an observation that may have massive implications for the treatment of depression. [cite journal | first = Alec | last = Coppen | coauthors = Bailey, J. | title = Enhancement of the antidepressant action of fluoxetine by folic acid: a randomised, placebo controlled trial | journal = The Journal of Affective Disorders | date = 2000 | volume = 60 | pages = 121–30 | doi = 10.1016/S0165-0327(00)00153-1]

Personal life

In 1952, Coppen married Gunhild Andersson, who came from Sweden. They had one child Michael, also a doctor. Gunhild died on 26 May 2007, of a sudden illness.

References