Posted by yxibow on March 31, 2006, at 14:11:40
In reply to Re: Tolerance to Benzo Anxiety Effects, posted by Sobriquet Style on March 31, 2006, at 11:27:56
> >Some doctors are simply benzophobes, they are in my opinion, in a proper dosing scheme, one of the safest psychiatric medications as we have more than 40 years of experience with them, especially Valium.
>
> I agree wholeheartly. Do you think out of all the benzo's, valium is the safest, short and long term?There's always a definiton of safe. I take a high amount of Valium for a noxious anxiety commplex disorder, but my level of metabolism may not be your level at all.
Safe is, of coure monitoring for signs of habituation (escalation of dose) (I don't ascribe to the "addictive" view, unless one already has an addictive genetics or tendency), and only gradually going up or down on dosage.
Benzodiazepines are much safer than the barbiturates they replaced, but can still cause respiratory depression mostly usually if someone combines them with a fair amount of alcohol.
Doesn't say you can't have a drink now and then but they're all CNS depressants (alcohol, and OTC things, benadryl, etc..)
Most people would probably take in the 10-40mg range, maybe topping at most at a high range of 80mg/dy (equivalent to 4mg Klonopin.)
But to get back to your question, yes, I do think so, with the caveat that since everything goes through P450 in the liver, Valium is metabolized at 3A4 so drugs that use 3A4 may cause a lower level of Valium in your blood and they may have to be adjusted. But these are common issues, 1A2, etc. I'm getting a bit over the top probably, but that's the gist. In summary, its 24+ hour half life makes removal from the system easier and yes I do think it is one of the safer ones long term. There are people still taking it since it came out in 1962. (It was the 2nd benzo, Librium came out in 1960.)
Cheers-- J
poster:yxibow
thread:626479
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20060329/msgs/627135.html