Posted by Quintal on May 9, 2008, at 13:50:03
Dr. W (big pdoc) off sick again with a bad back. My social worker phoned him at home to ask for my other 7 zopiclone tablets and some lofepramine. He refused both, lofepramine because "it's not at all sedating". This is the same one that doesn't believe 5mg Zyprexa is sedating to any significant degree. He didn't suggest any alternative that might be helpful, but that wasn't the point - the point was to make me feel stupid and small for trying to suggest my own meds in the first place. I wanted lofepramine mostly for the antidepressant action. Any sedation that it might confer would be an added bonus. In my experience all tricyclics are sedating to some extent, although I agree (and knew when I suggested it) that lofepramine is the least sedating out of all of them. The reason I didn't suggest one of the more (profoundly) sedating TCAs such as amitriptyline or doxepin was that I don't want to be sedated well into the next day.
The BNF advises that lofepramine be taken at night, and I've only known them recommend this with antidepressants that are likely to make people feel sleepy. Activating antidepressants are given in the morning. When I was in hospital they were giving it to the opiate addicts that shared the ward (it was a joint psychiatric/detox unit), so I thought it might be helpful to me on that count too.
Pdoc's understudy has had to go back to Cyprus and will be gone for some time. So with Dr. W off on indefinite sick leave, the psychiatric outpatients clinic is basically closed until further notice. This is our golden opportunity to get to see Dr. B who gave me zopiclone and amisulpride in hospital, so this is what my social worker and I are planning to do. We're going to engineer a depressive crisis that requires urgent intervention so she has a reason to make an emergency appointment with Dr. B, who will hopefully agree to both zopiclone and lofepramine, or at least have some helpful ideas of his own.
Both my social worker and I hope Dr. W's back specialist is kinder and more merciful than himself. How awful if he were to get stuck with a such a selfish, ignorant bastard as himself. My inner sadist hopes he can't sleep at night either.
Q
poster:Quintal
thread:828200
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20080430/msgs/828200.html