Posted by medlib on December 11, 2002, at 11:17:33
In reply to Zoloft and jaw clenching, posted by agencypanic on December 10, 2002, at 19:47:41
Hi agencypanic--
It's a fairly good bet that the jaw tension/clenching you describe is EPS (extrapyramidal symptoms), a mixed bag of movement disorders thought to be caused by dopamine (DA) depletion in the substantia nigra portion of the brain. Some serotonin neurons 5HT2 type) synapse on DA neurons and inhibit their synthesis of DA. SSRIs such as Zoloft, which increase the availability of serotonin, can decrease the production of dopamine in a dose-dependent manner. This effect may also account for the emotional blunting some SSRI users experience.
Some SSRIs may be more likely to cause EPS than other antidepressants. It's been mentioned in connection with Zoloft, Prozac and Paxil (that I know of). Your pdoc should be notified.
Hope this helps a bit---medlib
poster:medlib
thread:131276
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20021210/msgs/131334.html