Posted by chemist on April 26, 2004, at 23:03:55
In reply to Does anyone know anything about Symbyax for BP?, posted by greywolf on April 26, 2004, at 21:52:10
> The FDA apparently approved a drug called Symbyax for bipolar depression recently. Does anyone have any experience with it?
it's listed, but therapeutic indications are unavailable to me....symbyax is an attempt by lilly - which has not made their numbers for a long time - to reformulate 2 drugs into one (last attempt: serafem, simply a smaller dosage of prozac in a pink pill targeted for the dubious PMDD in women). symbyax is prozac+zyprexa, and the reason it is on the market is that the patent expired on prozac (fluoxetine) 3 years ago, and the PMDD crowd has gotten wise to the fact that you can get generic fluozetine tablets and cut them in half. enough said. symbyax will cost you more than 2 scripts, one for generic fluoxetine, and the other for (still under patent) zyprexa. presumably, the fluoxetine will offset the weight gain associated with zyprexa, but the real reason this combo is out there is to increase revenue for lilly. again, it's prozac + zyprexa. proceed at your own risk, and prozac is among the most stimulating ssris, so unless your bipolar is more towards the depressed side, dump it. even if it is, get the generic fluoxetine and the zyprexa prn......all the best, chemist
poster:chemist
thread:340380
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20040423/msgs/340403.html