Posted by med_empowered on January 3, 2006, at 17:56:07
In reply to Re: Do barbiturates make you depressed? » rjlockhart, posted by yxibow on January 3, 2006, at 14:26:16
tranquilizers in general can cause or maintain depression. Benzos usually aren't too bad, although it can and does happen with most of them (particularly tranxene and klonopin).
Barbiturates are really not a good idea for most people, but sometimes they're the only thing that works. If someone has severe insomnia and needs seconal for a week or so, that's really not too big a deal, as long as they're not a high-risk patient.
Amobarbital in particular is good for severe anxiety, insomnia, and treatment of catatonia....since even today docs tend to use super-high dose antipsychotics and/or electroshock for catatonic stupor, Amobarbital presents a relatively benign option.
Overall, though, I think benzos are the way to go for most people...from what I've read, lack of response to benzos usually means either the patient isn't getting enough of the benzo in question OR there are other issues (ex: anxiety secondary to psychosis or paranoia) that also need to be addressed. Barbiturates (and Miltown) are probably best suited for anaesthesia and pain relief (ex: Fioricet, Equagesic) and rare use in psychiatry.
That said..apparently, the whole issue of addiction to barbiturates (like the issue of addiction to benzos) has been way overblown. If you go back and read medical articles from the 60s and 70s, alot of docs still RX'd barbs b/c for *most* patients they were safe and effective. High-risk patients and highly disturbed patients did better on benzos.
Good luck!
poster:med_empowered
thread:594763
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20051231/msgs/594875.html