Posted by novelagent on June 14, 2012, at 16:44:11
In reply to Re: SLS.. An awsome xenobiologic that U DONT KNOW ABOU » novelagent, posted by SLS on June 14, 2012, at 8:17:23
> > > I bet cariprazine and Abilify display some potential for treating cocaine addiction - much like buprenorphine aids in the treatment of heroin addiction. The key here is partial agonism at the relevant receptors; D2/D3 dopamine receptors for cocaine and µ opioid receptors for heroin.
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> > Abilify increased meth use in one study...
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> Do you recall where you saw this?
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> > beyond that, it's typically weak.
>It wasn't on cocaine, it was a study reviewing methamphetamine research. It was Abilify 15mg, and it was reported in a review article, going over many of the treatments used today. It might have been for cocaine as well, I'm not sure.
Whatever works, more power to you. I didn't know this was personally affecting you; I for some reason thought you had just an academic interest. There was an interesting title of a letter I couldn't read, as I don't have access to databases, but it was on "brain repair" and cognitive enhancers for helpung addicts recover from stimulant abuse.
All I know is, I took Abilify for a summer and a semester, so like 8 months. I made a point never to take more of the stimulant than I was prescribed in all of that time, because I didn't want to mess up my wiring-- not even if it was for an all-nighter. In fact, I made a rule for myself not to do all-nighters for all of that time, which was for me unheard of-- most of my papers were done as all-nighters at that point in my college life... it was sad.
Anyhow, I just remember feeling like I could take on the world, and afterwards, for a few months maybe after I had stopped taking the Aricept, I remember not taking my stimulant medication for 3 days and still feeling normal. That's unheard of for me-- I normally would go into a deep anhedonic state, sleeping for the first 3 days all day while off it.
So it did some long-term brain repair, I know that. I just took it for that 8 months, as was my intent, because I just wanted to repair my brain from residual cognitive impairment from depression. I wasn't depressed anymore, but I felt I could use some optimization of my brain to get back to where I was before more.
> In what respect? Pharmacologically, Abilify is a potent D2/D3 receptor ligand, having a high binding affinity. If you are referring to its potential to effectively treat schizophrenia,
>No, Abilify is a powerful antipsychotic, it's just that the review article I read claimed it wasn't very effective, but now that I think of it, I think it mentioned it was only found it was used in one study.
One of the major problems of drug abuse research, however, is that it's hard to tell apart whether the group being researched is just happening to be well-motivated or not, and it's also hard to distinguish just how severely addicted someone is compared to others. Expectation of drug effect is tricky-- what exactly does "working" mean? Does it mean your life is 100% back to normal, like it was before drug addiction? That's unrealistic for any drug, so if patients are given that suggestion somehow in the course of the study, they'll of course fail. If they get counseled, and told by therapists as part of a CBT component of the study that the drug obly can do so much, even if it does work-- well, they might be inclined to do a bit better than placebo, because they work with perhaps whatever minimal advantage the drug offers them, bolstering that difference to their advantage.
I'm like you when it comes to questioning studies that claim to say something "doesn't work" flat out by saying it's "ineffective" when it comes to cognitive enhancement studies for schizophrenia. Is Aricept going to transform someone who's unable to give you a coherent sentence at the state hospital, and is drooling at the mouth from clozapine? Is it going to make that person awesome again? No, but it's also absurd that that would be conidered the marker for "effective."
Effective should mean a few points better on a cognitive battery test, but it's been found that motivation plays a huge factor in those tests, so if someone's not feeling extra motivated, they're not going to accurately reflect the improvement the drug gave. I have difficulty believing, on a certain level, some of the benefits I had from Aricept can even be quantified, exactly. It made things just feel effortless sometimes, and helped my poetic faculties. But for all I know, I would have had no improvement on some stupid, simple test like the stroop test (doubtful-- I think my processing speed increased).
But keep in mind, I was also on an amphetamine while on Aricept (Desoxyn)-- so the two combined to give a unique effect, bolstering each other's effects. I had to take less of each med as a result, even.
I haven't investigated it. However, I am not sure it would be the best choice when positive symptoms predominate. That is just a guess, though. For bipolar disorder, the combination of Abilify and Lamictal provide greater prophylaxis against relapse than either drug alone (as detailed in the current NIMH Bipolar Network Newsletter).
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> > The literature typically lists a host of meds that do nothing,
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> Shhhh. Please don't let my poor brain find out this secret. I wouldn't want to jeopardize my current placebo response to it.
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> Seriously, I would be very interested to see the literature that you allude to.
>"amphetamine cognitive enhancer" "amphetamine donazepil (sp)" should be a start. Or cocaine donazepil, or cocaine cognitive enhancer, cognitive dysfunction, in medline.
> My comments about Abilify and addiction were limited to cocaine use, not amphetamine use:
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> http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21524261
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> There is this, though:
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> http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21373790
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> Obviously, there is not yet a consensus regarding the potential for Abilify to treat cocaine use. However, that Abiify can blunt the effects of cocaine is not questioned.
>As you point out, your experience mat be different because you're combining these drugs, and the studies rarely go for combinations of a treatment. I know that antipsychotics don't blunt amphetamine's euphoria, but I don't know anything about cocaine, so I'll take your word for it.
> Another way to blunt the effects of psychostimulants and cocaine is to administer prazosin.
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> I think we are in agreement that paper theories are often of little value when evaluating the utility of psychotropic drugs.yup.
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> - Scott
>
poster:novelagent
thread:1019274
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20120608/msgs/1019738.html