Posted by jimmygold70 on February 12, 2001, at 18:29:17
I’ve suffered from anxiety disorders from many years so far. My diagnoses vary: Social Phobia (Consensus), Borderline Personality Disorder without temper outbursts (Psychologist), Avoidant Personality Disorder (Psychiatrist I), Schizoid Personality Disorder (Psychologist, Psychiatrist II), Obsessive-Compulsive Personality Disorder (Psychiatrist III).
In short, all clinicians agree that I have an anxiety disorder, most agree that I fall in cluster C, and my psychologist, that seems to be the most knowledgeable of all, Also puts me in Cluster B.
I have tried all sorts of medications: SSRIs (practically each and every), MAOI (phenelzine), RIMA (moclobemide), NARI (reboxetine), SNRI (venlafaxine), Novel (nefazodone,mianserin), Benzodiazepines (clonazepam,alprazolam,alprazolam XR).
I had some, but not overwhelming success with the SSRIs, and I still take sertraline. Anything that acted on the noradrenergic system seemed a failure. Benzodiazepines were good but made me so forgetful in effective doses and ineffective in lower doses.
Then, I suddenly come to know that sulpiride, which is available here in Israel, might be of help. My psychologist also insists that he sees it as helpful in similar situations, but, unfortunately, he cannot prescribe anything…
My psychiatrist (No. III, the last one) insists that I should not take sulpiride, since it will cause me tardive dyskinesia. He has good reasons to believe that – my grandfather of my mother’s side took haloperidol in low doses for Bipolar for many years, and ended up with TD. My father took thioridazine in a low dose for a very short time for acute hypomanic episode, and had severe extrapyramidal symptoms. My psychiatrist insists that, regardless of my genetics, sulpiride is supposed to be effective but harmful in the long term, so he refused to prescribe it.
Eventually, after many efforts, I managed to put my hand on sulpiride, and it does seem to work better than anything else before. I take 50mgx2 (probably the lowest dose possible). I have taken it for a couple of days with no side effects so far.
Now, my plan is to use it for a month and see if it works. However, if I discover that it does (and so it looks so far) – I have a problem. No, it’s very easy to say “don’t take it – why take the risk ?”. But it might be the only available treatment that does work for me. In that case, I might look for two other senior psychiatrists, that would act as a “committee”, and see what they see (BTW I got the idea from the ECT approval here in Israel - you need 3 MDs to sign in order to get it…).
1. What do you think ?
2. Have you seen any similar cases ?
3. Is there really any serious concern for TD with sulpiride in low doses ?
4. Are there any early signs for TD development (i.e. tremor) on sulpiride?
5. And the most important Question (!) – In case sulpiride does work for me, can you think of another drug with similar pharmacology (olanzapine ??? anything ?!) that might help me with lower incidence of EP symptoms ?Thanks a lot !!!
Jimmy
poster:jimmygold70
thread:53827
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20010212/msgs/53827.html