Posted by chess on September 22, 2006, at 10:41:17
i have ocd, pure-o type, and i take lexapro for it, but my anxiety and ocd are still high, my doc has offered to add memantine to the lexapro,
but first i've done some research about the use of medications for anxiety that affect glutamate, and I've learned that the fearful memories or "fear memory responses" we OCDers have that are tormenting us are not re-wired or destroyed with therapy and meds BUT rather new "healthy memories" are made that over-ride the older "fear memory responses" and it's by doing CBT-ERP that we form these "new healthy memory responses". I came across this while surfing the web, "The use of partial AGONISTS (like d-cycloserine) at the NMDA receptor for acute augmentation of the emotional learning within psychotherapy represents a novel and potentially very powerful new therapeutic tool. Glutamate receptors clearly serve to mediate the learning events that take place during the acquisition of fear. Recognition that treatment of anxiety disorders also includes new emotional learning in the form of extinction that may be facilitated with augmentation at the NMDA receptor, provides for an exciting set of opportunities for the treatment of these often refractory disorders." This explains why d-cycloserine may help with OCD therapy because it's an NMDA-receptor AGONIST and thus would assist with the formation of new healthy memory responses and therefore extinction.But memantine (Namenda) is a NMDA-receptor ANTAGONIST, so then wouldn't it actually interfere with the formation of new "healthy memory responses" and thus interfere with extinction?
poster:chess
thread:688149
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20060919/msgs/688149.html