Drug Combinations Can Mess You Up

[Skyler]

ADs are not mentioned in here, but you can bet they are implicated. Heath Ledger was vulnerable to an OD because he was taken off an AD CT or after a very rapid AD taper and was trying to medicate withdrawal symptoms. Curious though, how ADs tacitly get a pass.~S

 

8 Drug Combinations That Can Really Mess You Up

 

Mixing some of these drugs together is a bit like throwing a Molotov cocktail at your own body.

 

There are dozens of chemicals that can render you friendless, jobless and despondent—if not outright kill you—all by themselves. That makes mixing them together a bit like throwing a Molotov cocktail at your own body. Too much of drug A may cause liver failure, say. Add a little of drug B and it might happen two hours sooner. Toss in drug C, and maybe you’ll stop breathing before your liver even gets involved.

 

Because every person reacts slightly differently, there’s virtually no way to determine which drug combination is most likely to land you, personally, in a body bag. But that doesn’t mean some pairings aren't deadlier than others. Some—like the painkiller/anti-anxiety drug/sleeping pill cocktail that killed Heath Ledger, and has been soaring in drug use stats—terrify even medical professionals.

 

Based on SAMHSA's Drug Abuse Warning Network (DAWN) report—and the opinions of Dr. Joseph Lee, medical director of Hazelden’s youth continuum, and Dr. Cynthia Lewis-Younger, managing/medical director at the Florida Poison Information Center - Tampa—here are some of the very worst offenders:

 

Alcohol Combos

 

1. Alcohol and benzos

Benzodiazepines were involved in over a fifth of drug- and alcohol-related hospital visits in 2009, according to the DAWN report—and you can bet that respiratory failure was a factor in most cases. The likelihood of this pairing happening in a party setting is an added danger; fellow revelers might be inclined to let the guy who overdid it sleep it off while they carry on having fun. That’s a really bad move, says Dr. Lewis-Younger: “We have a cultural mantra, I guess, in this country about letting people sleep it off. I cannot tell you how many tragedies that I have heard of in my duties that happened because of it.”

 

2. Alcohol and prescription painkillers

Even though this combo causes slightly fewer hospital visits than mixing drinks with benzos—15% of visits involving alcohol and drugs, versus 21% that involve anxiety drugs—it may be growing in popularity. The number of emergency room trips due to fentanyl, hydrocodone, hydromorphone, morphine, and oxycodone doubled between 2004 and 2009. And if that trend continues, more problems caused by mixing them with alcohol can’t be far behind. What’s worse, this particular combination, like alcohol and benzos, tends to be common among young women (think: Hollywood starlets) who indulge at parties and concerts—and alcohol has stronger effects on women than on men.

 

Cocaine Combos

 

3. Cocaine and opiates

Ah, the dreaded speedball. In the ’80s and ’90s—when this combination felled John Belushi, Chris Farley and River Phoenix—this might have topped the combo list. Don’t get too comfortable though; any drop in prominence is mainly due to the increased popularity of prescription pills. The speedball remains just as dangerous as ever. “So many different things—seizures, heart attacks, strokes, unregulated body temperature—can happen when you take drugs that stimulate you, like cocaine," says Dr. Lee. "And then, on the other side you have the respiratory depression. If you have a combination of the two, it can make it harder for you to recognize the impact of one chemical.”

 

4. Cocaine and ecstasy

Just like combining two depressants, combining two stimulants can exacerbate the effects of both. Though you’ll hardly fall asleep and stop breathing on this drug cocktail, you might well stop breathing in another way. Ecstasy on its own can damage the cardiovascular system and cause problems with body temperature regulation, and cocaine can do the same. If you're dancing at a hot sweaty club or a summer music festival while taking both, you’re pretty much asking to overheat or have a stroke. What’s more, these two drugs frequently come cut; you really have no idea what you’re getting. As Dr. Lewis-Younger puts it, “Combining any unknown with any other unknown? It’s like Russian roulette.”

Go here to read more.

[Barbarannamated]

The main difference I see is that opiates, alcohol, cocaine, perhaps benzos, MAY be lethal to person taking them in combination or excess, however,

 

SS/NRIs are lethal TO RANDOM STRANGERS as well. A quick glance at school shootings and other killing sprees over the last 20 years almost all involve SS/NRIs. The media usually reports that someone "is suspected to have GONE OFF their 'bipolar med'", but it's more common that the SS/NRI causes these suicidal and homicidal actions in people with NO HISTORY OF VIOLENCE or mania/bipolar.

 

Also, it is not "unmasking bipolar", it is creating havoc in the brain that was not there previously. The bipolar story is a convenient way to sell more drugs.

[Rhiannon]

Oh yeah, don't you love that "unmasking" thing? You take drugs and develop these weird new behaviors and symptoms so let's see...oh yeah, that's who you really were all along, it's just that the drugs finally showed the truth! That's logical, isn't it?

 

Like, if you took a bunch of arsenic, it would unmask the fact that you were really dead all along.

 

And about drug combinations that can mess you up: what about benzos and Lamictal? Neurontin and benzos? ADs and benzos? ADs and Lamictal and antipsychotics? That is--the highly profitable drug combinations that people are actually taking. That they're giving teenagers, children, toddlers, with still-developing brains. (The brain's not fully myelinated and mature until the mid-20s.)

 

Okay, stepping off the soapbox for now, but only because I have to go to work early today.

[Barbarannamated]

 

 

Like, if you took a bunch of arsenic, it would unmask the fact that you were really dead all along.

Okay, stepping off the soapbox for now, but only because I have to go to work early today.

 

And how Morontin unmasks the underlying moron? Thank goodness we have these drugs to reveal the true homicidal maniacs living among us.

 

Please, Rhi, revisit this soapbox at your earliest convenience!

 

I know this is posted elsewhere, but for sake of ease:

http://www.antidepressantsfacts.com/casualties.htm

[jmim]

Like, if you took a bunch of arsenic, it would unmask the fact that you were really dead all along.

 

this quote made my day. and made me laugh out loud. uh, oh. people might think i'm getting a little too happy.

[Barbarannamated]

Yup. There always a diagnosis waiting in the wings...

[Barbarannamated]

 

Like, if you took a bunch of arsenic, it would unmask the fact that you were really dead all along.

 

Husband (yea, that MD) and I just had a "discussion" about the "unmasking" of bipolar by antidepressants. He buys it. Yes, really. So, I HAD to steal your brilliant comment, Rhi, and email to him (in the next room) along with link to Antidepressantfacts crime page with accompanying comment "it's a relief to know the antidepressants unmasked all this violent bipolar before they could do REAL harm."

Channeling my inner *****.

 

You must coin your quote so i can use it and give due credit, Rhi!