Posted by Fred23 on June 11, 2004, at 21:51:05
Several months ago I posted the question here how to ask my GP for Xanax to help reduce the anxiety that I feel is contributing to the high blood pressure he had diagnosed me with. I also posted the Jan 2004 discovery here of the genetic link that the people predisposed to become alcoholics have overactive brain activity due to faulty GABA regulation.
As Xanax is given out rather freely in this area, to people who end up not taking it, I was able to get some to experiment with briefly, and found that simply 0.5 mg per day was "enough" to counteract the gnawing anxiety.
That was several months ago, and at my followup appointment I asked my doctor about something for the anxiety which is a factor in my blood pressure situation. He does not prescribe Xanax, but gave me Ativan (lorazepam), as 0.5 mg tablets, to be taken three times per day. The generic brand I got was Mylan, and I'm aware the equivalence charts say that Ativan has half the strength of Xanax. (Also their half-lives and onset times are somewhat similar.)
So, I figured that 1.0 mg (two tablets at once) of the generic Ativan should have about the same effect as 0.5 mg of Xanax.
But, the effect wears off much quicker.
1. Does Ativan have less actual "power" due to being a different chemical, and this is as expected?
2. Could the generic Ativan be significantly weaker than the name brand, and thus need "more" to have the true effect?
3. Would the approach to test this be to get name brand Ativan on the next refill? Can the patient just request name brand, if willing to pay the difference (insurance co-payments). Or does the doctor have to authorize the switch?
4. Or, should I just ask the doctor for a higher dosage, with the implications that go with that?
In other words, which is the better approach, to ask for the name brand to have a lower dose on record, or ask for a higher dose of the generic to make up the difference, but be seen as someone who wants to bump his dosage?
poster:Fred23
thread:355916
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20040608/msgs/355916.html