Effects of hypnotic and sleep-inducing drugs on objective assessments of human psychomotor performance and subjective appraisals of sleep and early morning behaviour

Abstract

An acute dose comparison against placebo of the effects of nitrazepam 5 mg and temazepam 15 and 30 mg on measures of arousal and performance and on subjective assessment of sleep was carried out in 20 subjects with a history of using night-time medication for insomnia. Amylobarbitone (100 mg) was included as an active control and each drug was given in hard gelatin capsules. Subjects reported improved sleep with nitrazepam 5 mg and temazepam 30 mg, but there was evidence of impaired performance the next day with temazepam 30 mg. The effect of temazepam 20 mg prepared in the Scherer formulation was compared against placebo in a further ten subjects. The subjects reported improved sleep without evidence of impaired performance the next day.