![[dr. bob]](/dr-bob-sm.gif)
Dr. Bob is Robert Hsiung, MD,
bob@dr-bob.orgShown: posts 1 to 3 of 3. This is the beginning of the thread.
Posted by Seamus2 on January 11, 2002, at 19:18:38
I'm on my fourth week of Parnate and as far as I'm concerned that stuff is a miracle drug.
I'm looking back and thinking, "How could I not know I was THAT depressed!" The onset is so insidious for me that's it's not until I'm completely in the pit that it dawns on me -- "Hey, it's your old pal, depression!"
So for the folks out there reading this board for the first time, please note that some drugs *do* work and work *well*.
Posted by CalvaryHill on January 11, 2002, at 20:28:08
In reply to Success w/ Parnate, posted by Seamus2 on January 11, 2002, at 19:18:38
If you get Parnate poop-out (God forbit), augment the Parnate with Risperdal, which is mentioned prominently in the American Journal of Psychiatry somewhere (I forgot where). Or consider a trial with pindolol, a partial serotonin blocker.
:)
Posted by Elizabeth on January 14, 2002, at 19:46:37
In reply to Success w/ Parnate, posted by Seamus2 on January 11, 2002, at 19:18:38
Congratulations. :-) Parnate's a good drug and relatively tolerable for a lot of people compared to other ADs. I'm glad you've found something that is working well for you.
I did try both the augmentation strategies that CalvaryHill suggests and I wasn't impressed. I don't think it's that easy to predict what sorts of things will work for any particular person. Unless there's a specific reason to believe they'll help, I don't think that dopamine antagonists (antipsychotics, like Risperdal) should be first-line augmentors for depression (since they have the potential to make depression worse for some people). The AD augmentors that have the best success records are stimulants, lithium, and T3. Although these require monitoring, I'd urge caution also about anticonvulsant augmentation, because its efficacy is questionable and because there may be unknown risks (my bias here is that I've developed what appear to be complex partial seizures after having tried, over a period of a few years, a bunch of different anticonvulsant "mood stabilizers" for non-bipolar depression -- the anticonvulsant trials and the seizures may be unrelated, but I do have to wonder). I haven't been too impressed with the stories I've heard or the studies I've read about pindolol, or with my own experience on it, but it's relatively safe (except for people with certain types of cardiac arrhythmias).
Best wishes,
-elizabeth
This is the end of the thread.
Psycho-Babble Medication | Extras | FAQ
Dr. Bob is Robert Hsiung, MD,
bob@dr-bob.org
Script revised: February 4, 2008
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/cgi-bin/pb/mget.pl
Copyright 2006-17 Robert Hsiung.
Owned and operated by Dr. Bob LLC and not the University of Chicago.