Antidepressants Don't Help Kleptomaniacs

The small size of the study means the potential of this treatment can't be dismissed, the authors stated.

"Some of these people told me that they had been through many other treatments, had been in jail, divorced, nothing stopped them from thinking about stealing," Koran said. "But when they took the drug, they weren't thinking about it. They didn't have the urge. It's hard to believe that that's a placebo effect."

Koran suspects the disorder is more complicated than experts realize.

"I think this is a behavior that has different biological roots in different people," he said. "For some, the drug was active on serotonin and probably was effective, and for others, it was a placebo effect. It's also possible the drug worked for some and lost its effect. If we had increased the dose, they may have continued to see a benefit. We're on the outside looking in, and we don't know what's going on in the brain.

But others didn't necessarily agree.

"This doesn't contradict the weight of evidence," Sussman said. "This simply confirms what we already suspected."

A second study by the same researchers looking at the same drug found that Lexapro also did not help people with compulsive buying disorder.

Again, this finding contradicts prior results from an open-label trial showing a benefit. The latest trial, a randomized one, involved only 17 participants.

More information

For more on kleptomania, visit New York University Medical Center.

SOURCES: Lorrin Koran, M.D., professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, Calif.; Norman Sussman, M.D., dean, postgraduate education, and professor of psychiatry, New York University School of Medicine, New York City; March 2007,Journal of Clinical Psychiatry