Posted by SLS on February 10, 2005, at 6:43:13
In reply to Re: Need Your Help So Agitated » SLS, posted by Phillipa on February 9, 2005, at 23:30:21
> I'm asuming I'm still dx'd with anxiety/depression. I have been given small doses of Paxil 5-l0mg for years,
What motivated you to try other medications?
What happened with the Paxil?
Recently, there has been renewed interest in the use of tricyclic antidepressants (TCA) here on Psycho-Babble. Very often, the anxiety and depression are inseparable, with anxiety being a symptom of a depressive disorder rather than it being a disorder of its own. If you alleviate the depression, you also alleviate the anxiety. If find your treatments unsatisfactory, you might want to try taking a TCA like nortriptyline or desipramine. If you sleep rather poorly, you can instead use a more sedating drug like doxepin or amitriptyline. Nortriptyine is probably the mildest of these drugs. If you use it, though, you must pay attention to blood levels to help determine dosage. Most people do well at a dosage of 75mg. However, these same people can actually experience a return of depression if they go much higher. For me, it seems that 100mg it right. People will usually respond with blood levels that lie between 50-150 ng/ml. I am somewhere around 120ng/ml.
Of course, there are other alternatives that you haven't explored yet.
- Scott
poster:SLS
thread:455701
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20050207/msgs/455816.html