Posted by metric on March 17, 2009, at 17:44:46
In reply to Re: Antipsychotics? All the same? » metric, posted by yxibow on March 17, 2009, at 6:02:48
> This is such a vast generalization of neuroleptics I'm floored...
>
> They are with out much doubt among the only agents that bring life and peace to people with serious psychotic conditions. They have and still enable people with schizophrenia and other related disordersThat's often claimed, but rarely by the one's given the drugs. People on neuroleptics don't have the desire to do anything; they're docile vegetables. The drugs are thus beneficial to caregivers and others who might interact with the patient, but not the patient himself. With no other class of drugs is "compliance" such an issue.
> People aren't "victims" and that does great disservice to people on this board whose suffering has been helped by APs.
I think "victim" is an appropriate term to describe those individuals who are given neurolepetics against their will (why do you think long-acting depot injections are available?) as well as healthy people (most mental patients) who are given the drugs without informed consent regarding the well-known toxicity of drugs in this class.
> As for off-label use, well that depends on the situation. I'm not going to argue that there are places that agents with less liability in AFFECTIVE disorder patients could be used first line before resorting to APs.
Prolonged neuroleptic use leads to the loss of dopaminergic neurons (of which tardive dyskinesia is probably a manifestation). Fortunately, they make nearly everbody feel so incredibly awful that they're seldom taken long long enough to do harm.
poster:metric
thread:885316
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20090313/msgs/885796.html