Posted by stargazer2 on December 5, 2007, at 11:11:53
In reply to Re: Permanent side effects from antidepressants, posted by Ledgekay on December 5, 2007, at 9:06:50
What dose of Lexapro were you on? Have you looked into the effects of Serotonin Syndrome and it's long term effects if not recognized and treated promptly? That is the real issue even though Lexapro was given at too high of a dose. Your doc is obviously unfamilar with the syndrome and should not be prescribing medications if he ignors the symptoms of it. Hindsight is 20/20.
Medication side effects are going to be such a growing problem, as so many patients are taking newer mediations where the side effects are not known for years. How about the current litigation with Fosomax for bone loss of the jaw experienced by large numbers of users. There's a lawsuit pending on this. But hundreds or thousand have experienced this effect. So the lawsuit is against the manufacturer.
Have you reached out to others who have had late stage seritonin syndrome and were not taken off the medication immediately. Those are who you would need to find, to gather a voice and pursue a case against either the drug manufacturer (does the package insert include SS as a side effect?)or your doc if s(he) did not recognize the syndrome and treat it accordingly.
Have they prescibed anything like Cogentin for the tremors? That may be something to look into, not sure about if used for these kinds of tremors.
Your story is becoming more and more common and there should be a patient database for side effects since the pharmaceutical companies don't want to be bothered with this. It would be like hanging out a shingle to sue them. They have to focus on producing newer meds for the masses who are clamoring for new drugs, unlike previous generations who feared taking anything stronger than aspirin. Perhaps that older, more suspect generation had the right amount of caution.
I can only advise everyone out there that they think long and hard about the meds they take, the doses they are on and if your doctor ignores your side effects and wants you to press on despite you intuitively knowing you are in danger. You have to listen to that inner voice tell you when enough is enough. You may be dealing with an inexperienced doctor, too, rather than someone who is trained to listen to the patient and heed their concerns.
My experience with Zoloft was very bad, it made
me suicidal, but my pdoc said it was the depression getting worse. He wanted me to raise the dose but luckily I refused and stopped it against his advice. The suicidal thoughts evaporated that very day. If I had acted upon my SI, I would have killed myself and it would have seen as a casue of the depression, never the medication. No one would have ever questioned this side effect of Zoloft, since it was not known at the time to cause this effect. Now the black box warnings have made the connection with medications and suicidality.Raising a dose of medication beyond the recommended dose would raise a red flag to me, although it is done all the time (not to me) since I have refused to do this or to take atypical AP's, as they have side effects of tardive dyskinesia. I don't want to have if I don't have to and I have no psychotic features to my depression.
Side effects are the only warnings you will get before something critical can occur. Why doctors push dosages higher and higher when serious side effects result is pure malpractice, if you ask me.
Enough said, I fear for the people who accept their doctors advice blindly. Luckily, I have enough skepticism now as a result of how long I have taken medications. I'm not against using drugs at all, but I wish others (docs and patients) would be more cautious and understand the dangerousness of any meds, even aspirin if used improperly.
Sorry for your situation...
Stargazer
poster:stargazer2
thread:798761
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20071204/msgs/798919.html