Posted by yxibow on September 2, 2006, at 14:08:14
In reply to Re: Klonopin needs time to full potential?, posted by notfred on September 1, 2006, at 22:28:20
> The primary metabolite of Klonopin has a half life of 18 to 50 hours. With regular dosing it takes a few days for levels to reach a steady state. Follow your doc's orders, but I would not increase till I was on Klon for 3 days.
>
> With long acting meds, if you take too much you are stuck with it for a day or so. Low and slow is the key. Small increases with several days between.
In the human body as opposed to lab measurements of tertiary metabolites (like Restoril from Valium), Klonopin is closer to 16 hours, maybe a bit more, but not necessarily a full day and is dosed twice a day usually. There are subtle differences between the long acting (or short for that matter) benzodiazepines that one patient may find more useful than another. As Phillipa noted, she preferred Valium (and adjunctively Xanax), which is actually exactly what I do. There is some point to Valium though in that it has a 24+ hour potential and thus has less potential for habituation. Doesn't mean it won't occur or that adjustments may need to made along the way (I'm slowly trying to reduce personally).
I'd agree that slow adjustment to long acting benzodiazepines is a rational idea, since one doesn't know how much is the MED (minimum effective dose) until it is discovered and an excess isn't of particular use in the long term.Short term benzodiazepines though like Xanax should not really be used long term, although there was the patent extender (unusual for benzodiazepines) Xanax XR which made a once a day formulation, mainly for those already on a Xanax regime. I wouldn't start out on Xanax XR -- Xanax differs a bit because it has more "instant gratification", which is good in bad situations, but can lead to being used to that immediacy and then that quelling feeling becomes lost.
-- tidingsJay
poster:yxibow
thread:682037
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20060901/msgs/682333.html