Posted by europerep on June 18, 2011, at 10:24:44
In reply to more thoughts on my depression treatment options, posted by floatingbridge on June 18, 2011, at 2:40:53
Does your doc know *how* bad you feel? Of course he knows you feel bad, otherwise you wouldn't be seeing him and doing all that, but does he know how bad it is?
Maybe it would be good to mention this openly. Ask him what he thinks about an opioid in depression or mixed pain/depression. Although it may be easier to get him there if you have been on either Nardil or Parnate. As I see it, there are two issues for a doctor when it comes to prescribing opioids: abuse/addiction and liability issues. With a pain condition, maybe the "threshold" for prescribing an opioid is a little but lower.
Why did you go off tramadol back then though? Did it not deal with pain effectively? For how long did you take it? And did you feel a need to increase dosage regularly, or did you have one steady dose and were fine with it? If you feel you could responsibly use it - maybe with your husband keeping an eye on your dose (tramadol is a weaker opioid, but it still has considerable potential for abuse, and I don't think anyone is really 0% vulnerable to that) - couldn't you instead get it directly from a pain specialist? I mean, it's not like Oxys or Opana, and isn't it even in a different Schedule? I think so.
You could of course also write emails to those psychiatrists who have published on the use of opioids in depression, describe to them your case and ask whether they could offer any help to you. Most university professors I have contacted that way have replied, and usually they were very friendly. Maybe it's because I'm still quite young and they had sympathy/pity with me, but it's always worth a try.
poster:europerep
thread:988626
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20110610/msgs/988653.html