History
Carbamazepine was discovered by chemist Walter Schindler at J.R. Geigy AG (now part of Novartis) in Basel, Switzerland, in 1953. Schindler then synthesized the drug in 1960, before its anti-epileptic properties had been discovered.
Carbamazepine was first marketed as a drug to treat trigeminal neuralgia (formerly known as tic douloureux) in 1962. It has been used as an anticonvulsant and antiepileptic in the UK since 1965, and has been approved in the US since 1974.
In 1971, Drs. Takezaki and Hanaoka first used carbamazepine to control mania in patients refractory to antipsychotics (lithium was not available in Japan at that time). Dr. Okuma, working independently, did the same thing with success. As they were also epileptologists, they had some familiarity with the anti-aggression effects of this drug. Carbamazepine would be studied for bipolar disorder throughout the 1970s.
Read more about this topic: Carbamazepine
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