Posted by Dr. Vijoy on October 27, 2005, at 22:55:31
In reply to Re: Cymbalta withdrawal, posted by sam86 on October 27, 2005, at 22:36:51
Youre going to get the widthdrawl effects when discontinuning any of the antidepressants, but you need to understand that SSRIs like Prozac and Paxil act just on serotonin whereas Zoloft, Effexor, Cymbalta, Wellbutrin act on norepinephrine also. Therefore, withdrawl is worse for antidepressants acting on multiple neurotransmitters, however, the efficacy is better when working on serotonin and norepinephrine both.
Given this, if you switch to Wellbutrin or Zoloft you probably will have the same problem as Cymbalta, but your insurance company will like you more since those drugs are less costly.
Since your withdrawl symptoms sound normal and not exaggerated, I would probably just go ahead and do what youre doing in terms of cutting the dose and then going back up when you need to, as per your doctor's advice. The headache may respond to migraine medication since they work on serotonin kind of like cymbalta is working on. Let me give you an example... if you have an alcohol withdrawl, sometimes people take a little benzodiazepine like Valium to substitute for the depressant effects of alcohol and therefore lessen the widhdrawl. So if you cant bear the headaches, ask your doctor for an antimigraine medication it may help but just remember youre substituting one drug for another , in essence.
Your nurse friend may have good advice and may know firsthand about which drugs have less side effects, etc, since they work with many patients, but from my point of view I wouldnt expect any miracles if you switch over.
Take care.
V
poster:Dr. Vijoy
thread:466069
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/wdrawl/20051018/msgs/572580.html