Posted by sonic_gb on December 6, 2007, at 14:47:37
In reply to What's a good crosstaper schedule??, posted by qbsbrown on December 6, 2007, at 14:11:02
> Coming from 2mgs of klonopin, what would be a good way to taper over to Ativan??
>
> I tried going just directly over, but caused really bad depression.
>
> Regards,
>
> Brian
Let's assume you take 2mg of Klonopin and want to switch to 4mg of Ativan If I were to do it, it would go like this:Day 1: 2.0mg Klonopin, 0mg Ativan
Day 2: 1.5mg Klonopin, 1mg Ativan
Day 3: 1.0mg Klonopin, 2mg Ativan
Day 4: 0.5mg Klonopin, 3mg Ativan
Day 5: 0.0mg Klonopin, 4mg AtivanYou could do this twice as slowly by dividing the increments in half, and making it a 10-day cross-taper. This might be a little smoother, and advisable if the quick switch caused depression, but it gets hard to divide tablets at a certain point. I find that clonazepam just makes my depression worse, period. It's the only benzo I've tried that does this to me. The literature says it should do the opposite since it is slightly sertotonergic.
Also, the benzo equivalence charts aren't exact science. You might actually need slightly more or less Ativan to equate to 2mg of Klonopin. Keep this in mind.
This is slightly complicated because you're cross-tapering from a very long acting benzo to a short acting benzo, so for a while, you will have substantial Klonopin in your system, AND be taking a decent dose of Ativan. I wouldn't be surprised if you noticed an increase in sedation during the cross-taper, and then a decrease 2 or 3 days after the taper is complete.
Let me know if this makes sense, or if I've made any errors in logic or pharmacology here. I'm not a doctor, just someone interested in psychopharmacology...
Sonic
poster:sonic_gb
thread:798729
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20071204/msgs/799147.html