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Keller, 2007 The Prevention of Recurrent Episodes of Depression with Venlafaxine for Two Years (PREVENT) Study: Outcomes from the 2-year and combined maintenance phases.


westcoast

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J Clin Psychiatry. 2007 Aug;68(8):1246-56.
The Prevention of Recurrent Episodes of Depression with Venlafaxine for Two Years (PREVENT) Study: Outcomes from the 2-year and combined maintenance phases.
Keller MB1, Trivedi MH, Thase ME, Shelton RC, Kornstein SG, Nemeroff CB, Friedman ES, Gelenberg AJ, Kocsis JH, Dunner DL, Hirschfeld RM, Rothschild AJ, Ferguson JM, Schatzberg AF, Zajecka JM, Pedersen RD, Yan B, Ahmed S, Musgnung J, Ninan PT.

Abstract at http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17854250

OBJECTIVE:
To report second-year results from the 2-year maintenance phase of a long-term study to evaluate the efficacy and safety of venlafaxine extended release (ER) in preventing recurrence of depression.

METHOD:
Outpatients with recurrent unipolar depression (DSM-IV criteria; N = 1096) were randomly assigned in a 3:1 ratio to 10 weeks of treatment with venlafaxine ER or fluoxetine. Responders (17-item Hamilton Rating Scale for Depression [HAM-D(17)] total score <or= 12 and >or= 50% decrease from baseline) entered a 6-month, double-blind continuation phase on the same medication. Continuation-phase responders were enrolled into maintenance treatment consisting of 2 consecutive 12-month phases. At the start of each maintenance phase, venlafaxine ER responders were randomly assigned to receive double-blind treatment with venlafaxine ER or placebo, and fluoxetine responders were continued for each period. The second 12-month maintenance phase compared the time to recurrence of depression with venlafaxine ER (75 to 300 mg/day) versus placebo as the primary efficacy measure. The primary definition of recurrence was a HAM-D(17) total score > 12 and < 50% reduction from baseline (acute phase) at 2 consecutive visits or at the last valid visit prior to discontinuation. The time to recurrence was evaluated using Kaplan-Meier methods and compared between the venlafaxine ER and placebo groups using log-rank tests. Secondary outcome measures included rates of response and remission (defined as HAM-D(17) </= 7). The study was conducted from December 2000 through July 2005.

RESULTS:
The cumulative probabilities of recurrence through 12 months in the venlafaxine ER (N = 43) and placebo (N = 40) groups were 8.0% (95% CI = 0.0 to 16.8) and 44.8% (95% CI = 27.6 to 62.0), respectively (p < .001). At month 12, using last-observation-carried-forward analysis, the rate of response or remission was significantly higher in the venlafaxine ER group (93%) than in the placebo group (63%; p = .002). Overall discontinuation rates were 28% and 63% in the venlafaxine ER and placebo groups, respectively. Adverse events were the primary reason for discontinuation for 1 patient (2%) in the venlafax-ine ER group and 4 (10%) in the placebo group. An analysis of the combined maintenance phases, which compared the risk of recurrence over 24 months for patients assigned to venlafaxine ER (N = 129) or placebo (N = 129) for the first maintenance phase, showed a significantly greater cumulative probability of recurrence through 24 months for the placebo group (47.3% [95% CI = 36.4 to 58.2]) than for the venlafaxine ER group (28.5% [95% CI = 18.3 to 38.7]; p = .005).

CONCLUSION:
In this study, an additional 12 months of maintenance therapy with venlafaxine ER was effective in preventing recurrence of depression in patients who had been responders to venlafaxine ER after acute (10 weeks), continuation (6 months), and initial maintenance (12 months) therapy.

TRIAL REGISTRATION:
ClinicalTrials.gov identifier NCT00046020 (http://www.clinicaltrials.gov).
 
 
Full text at: http://www.researchgate.net/profile/Charles_Nemeroff/publication/5986854_The_Prevention_of_Recurrent_Episodes_of_Depression_with_Venlafaxine_for_Two_Years_(PREVENT)_Study_Outcomes_from_the_2-year_and_combined_maintenance_phases/links/0fcfd501af8b012645000000.pdf


AstraZeneca, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Cephalon, Forest, GlaxoSmithKline, Janssen, Jazz, KV, Ortho McNeil, Eli Lilly, Novartis, Organon, Pfizer, Shire, Solvay, and Wyeth-Ayerst.
Dr. Rothschild is a consultant to Eli Lilly, Forest, GlaxoSmithKline, Pfizer, and Merck; has received grant/research support from AstraZeneca, Cephalon, Cyberonics, Eli Lilly, Novartis, Pfizer, Wyeth-Ayerst, and NIMH; has received honoraria from Pfizer, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Forest, and Eli Lilly; and has participated in speakers/advisory boards for Pfizer, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Forest, and Eli Lilly.
Dr. Ferguson has been an investigator on at least one CNS
clinical trial for Amylin, Alkermes, Arena, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Cephalon, Eisai, Forest, Fujisawa, GlaxoSmithKline, Eli Lilly,
Merck, Mitsubishi Research, Myriad Genetics, Neurocrine, Neuronetics, Novartis, Johnson & Johnson, Pfizer, Sanofi-Aventis, Sepracor, Shire, Solvey, Takada, and Wyeth; is a consultant to
Wyeth, Merck, Neurion, and Shire; has received grant/research support from Wyeth, Eli Lilly, Pfizer, Merck, Solvay, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Sanofi, Forest, and Sepracor; and is a stock shareholder of Dr. Reddy Laboratories, Sanofi, and Forest.
Dr. Schatzberg is a consultant to Bristol-Myers Squibb, Quintiles, Eli Lilly, Wyeth, Corcept, Forest, Abbott, Merck, Neuronetics, Novartis, and Lundbeck; has received grant/research support from GlaxoSmithKline and Wyeth; is a stock shareholder of Pfizer, Forest, Corcept, and Merck; and has received royalties from Pathways Diagnostics.
Dr. Zajecka has received grant/research support from AstraZeneca, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Cephalon, Eli Lilly, Forest, McNeil, Novartis, and PamLab; is a consultant/advisory board member for Abbott, Biovail, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Eli Lilly, Otsuka, PamLab, and Wyeth-Ayerst; and has participated in speakers bureaus of Abbott, AstraZeneca, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Cyberonics, Eli Lilly, Pfizer, GlaxoSmithKline, and Wyeth-Ayerst.
Mr. Pedersen is an employee and stock shareholder of Wyeth. Mr. Musgnung is a stock shareholder of Eli Lilly and Wyeth. Drs. Yan, Ahmed, and Ninan are employees of Wyeth.

Edited by westcoast
conform to Journals format

2009: Cancer hospital said I had adjustment disorder because I thought they were doing it wrong. Their headshrinker prescribed Effexor, and my life set on a new course. I didn't know what was ahead, like a passenger on Disneyland's Matterhorn, smiling and waving as it climbs...clink, clink, clink.

2010: Post surgical accidental Effexor discontinuation by nurses, masked by intravenous Dilaudid. (The car is balanced at the top of the track.) I get home, pop a Vicodin, and ...

Whooosh...down, down, down, down, down...goes the trajectory of my life, up goes my mood and tendency to think everything is a good idea.
2012: After the bipolar jig was up, now a walking bag of unrelated symptoms, I went crazy on Daytrana (the Ritalin skin patch by Noven), because ADHD was a perfect fit for a bag of unrelated symptoms. I was prescribed Effexor for the nervousness of it, and things got neurological. An EEG showed enough activity to warrant an epilepsy diagnosis rather than non-epileptic ("psychogenic") seizures.

:o 2013-2014: Quit everything and got worse. I probably went through DAWS: dopamine agonist withdrawal syndrome. I drank to not feel, but I felt a lot: dread, fear, regret, grief: an utter sense of total loss of everything worth breathing about, for almost two years.

I was not suicidal but I wanted to be dead, at least dead to the experience of my own brain and body.

2015: I  began to recover after adding virgin coconut oil and organic grass-fed fed butter to a cup of instant coffee in the morning.

I did it hoping for mental acuity and better memory. After ten days of that, I was much better, mood-wise. Approximately neutral.

And, I experienced drowsiness. I could sleep. Not exactly happy, I did 30 days on Wellbutrin, because it had done me no harm in the past. 

I don't have the DAWS mood or state of mind. It never feel like doing anything if it means standing up.

In fact, I don't especially like moving. I'm a brain with a beanbag body.   :unsure:

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http://www.network54.com/Realm/peageedocs/GSKwheresmypaxil.pdf

 

Here is the maker of Paxil whining that Lilly is trying to make Paxil look bad.

 

http://www.network54.com/Realm/peageedocs/GSKwheresmypaxil.pdf

 

And making funny jokes. Look at page 2. A joke about agitation.

 

Plus they flat out say that Lilly launched a campaign to malign Paxil. The campaign was a journal article and a presentation at a conference.

2009: Cancer hospital said I had adjustment disorder because I thought they were doing it wrong. Their headshrinker prescribed Effexor, and my life set on a new course. I didn't know what was ahead, like a passenger on Disneyland's Matterhorn, smiling and waving as it climbs...clink, clink, clink.

2010: Post surgical accidental Effexor discontinuation by nurses, masked by intravenous Dilaudid. (The car is balanced at the top of the track.) I get home, pop a Vicodin, and ...

Whooosh...down, down, down, down, down...goes the trajectory of my life, up goes my mood and tendency to think everything is a good idea.
2012: After the bipolar jig was up, now a walking bag of unrelated symptoms, I went crazy on Daytrana (the Ritalin skin patch by Noven), because ADHD was a perfect fit for a bag of unrelated symptoms. I was prescribed Effexor for the nervousness of it, and things got neurological. An EEG showed enough activity to warrant an epilepsy diagnosis rather than non-epileptic ("psychogenic") seizures.

:o 2013-2014: Quit everything and got worse. I probably went through DAWS: dopamine agonist withdrawal syndrome. I drank to not feel, but I felt a lot: dread, fear, regret, grief: an utter sense of total loss of everything worth breathing about, for almost two years.

I was not suicidal but I wanted to be dead, at least dead to the experience of my own brain and body.

2015: I  began to recover after adding virgin coconut oil and organic grass-fed fed butter to a cup of instant coffee in the morning.

I did it hoping for mental acuity and better memory. After ten days of that, I was much better, mood-wise. Approximately neutral.

And, I experienced drowsiness. I could sleep. Not exactly happy, I did 30 days on Wellbutrin, because it had done me no harm in the past. 

I don't have the DAWS mood or state of mind. It never feel like doing anything if it means standing up.

In fact, I don't especially like moving. I'm a brain with a beanbag body.   :unsure:

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Seriously, are there any unbiased psych med studies that exist?  Don't want to sound like a conspiracy theorist but it doesn't seem that way.

Drug cocktail 1995 - 2010
Started taper of Adderall, Wellbutrin XL, Remeron, and Doxepin in 2006
Finished taper on June 10, 2010

Temazepam on a PRN basis approximately twice a month - 2014 to 2016

Beginning in 2017 - Consumption increased to about two times per week

April 2017 - Increased to taking it full time for insomnia

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The more you dig, the worse it gets.

2009: Cancer hospital said I had adjustment disorder because I thought they were doing it wrong. Their headshrinker prescribed Effexor, and my life set on a new course. I didn't know what was ahead, like a passenger on Disneyland's Matterhorn, smiling and waving as it climbs...clink, clink, clink.

2010: Post surgical accidental Effexor discontinuation by nurses, masked by intravenous Dilaudid. (The car is balanced at the top of the track.) I get home, pop a Vicodin, and ...

Whooosh...down, down, down, down, down...goes the trajectory of my life, up goes my mood and tendency to think everything is a good idea.
2012: After the bipolar jig was up, now a walking bag of unrelated symptoms, I went crazy on Daytrana (the Ritalin skin patch by Noven), because ADHD was a perfect fit for a bag of unrelated symptoms. I was prescribed Effexor for the nervousness of it, and things got neurological. An EEG showed enough activity to warrant an epilepsy diagnosis rather than non-epileptic ("psychogenic") seizures.

:o 2013-2014: Quit everything and got worse. I probably went through DAWS: dopamine agonist withdrawal syndrome. I drank to not feel, but I felt a lot: dread, fear, regret, grief: an utter sense of total loss of everything worth breathing about, for almost two years.

I was not suicidal but I wanted to be dead, at least dead to the experience of my own brain and body.

2015: I  began to recover after adding virgin coconut oil and organic grass-fed fed butter to a cup of instant coffee in the morning.

I did it hoping for mental acuity and better memory. After ten days of that, I was much better, mood-wise. Approximately neutral.

And, I experienced drowsiness. I could sleep. Not exactly happy, I did 30 days on Wellbutrin, because it had done me no harm in the past. 

I don't have the DAWS mood or state of mind. It never feel like doing anything if it means standing up.

In fact, I don't especially like moving. I'm a brain with a beanbag body.   :unsure:

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  • Moderator Emeritus

Wow, Westcoast... Just wow. I don't even want to read the full study. The whole idea just makes me want to scream. How I wish it were possible to get ahold of the raw data!!

 

Seriously, are there any unbiased psych med studies that exist?  Don't want to sound like a conspiracy theorist but it doesn't seem that way.

Likely not, Compsport. Pharm are the only ones with enough funding to do these studies. Unfortunately there's probably very little to no financial motivation to study AD withdrawal, and lots of motivation not too prove its existence. Unless a pharm company w/o ties to one of the plethora of SSRI wants to create a "treatment" for withdrawal, what motivation do they have to prove its existence? Universities are too tied in with pharm, and independent researchers simply don't have the money. If Dr.s like Healy, Shipko, or Breggin had the financial resources I would bet they'd do the necessary studies in a heartbeat. Perhaps, if someone knows a student looking for ideas for their doctoral thesis/dissertation?... And want to pursue publication...It wouldn't be the scope we'd like to see, but it might be a start anyway.

1988-2012: Prozac @ 60mg (with a few stops and starts)

Fall 2012: Returned to 40mg after discontinuing and horrid withdrawal 

Fall 2013: 40mg Fluoxetine, added 150mg Wellbutrin to treat fatigue 

Winter 2014: Attempting to taper both (too fast)

April 2014: 9mg Fluoxetine + 37.5 Wellbutrin 

Summer 2014: 8 mg Fluoxetine + 0 Wellbutrin (way too fast a drop)

Late summer/Early Fall 2014: Debilitating Withdrawal symptoms 

Fall 2014 - Wellbutrin successfully kicked to the curb but…

Oct- Dec 2014: Panicked reinstatement of Fluoxetine ->30mg - held for 5yrs

Jan 2021: taper to 20mg Fluoxetine  then tapering by 1mg every 2-3 months

Fall 2022 - held at 10mg->December 2022: 9mg->Feb 2023: 8mg ->March 2023: brassmonkey slide begins: 7.8mg -> 7.6 -> 7.4->2 week hold (April)->7.2->7mg->6.8->2 week hold->6.6-> 1-month hold ->(June)-6.5->4-week hold-> (July)-6.4 (discontinued brassmonkey slide and slowed taper)-> (Aug)-6.2->(Sept)-6.0->(Oct)-5.9->(Nov)-5.8->(Dec)-5.7->wave!->(Jan)-5.8->(Feb)-6mg and holding.

 

My 2014 withdrawal experience: https://rxisk.org/antidepressant-withdrawal-a-prozac-story/

 

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so many years watching... this is not my stuff... general knowledge... 

FDA workers slip back and forth from pharma to the FDA... 

they say there is not enough people with the right knowledge to do this sort of work so the slipping is a natural thing... 

 

Some think if you pass a drug pharma wants passed when you work at the FDA you get a cushy job with pharma the next year... I did not say this but there are reports it happens... not once or twice but repeatedly.... and lets not forget out friend... 

 

Marcia Angell... 

from wiki

"

Critic of conflicts of interest and biases in the medical establishment[edit]

In her 2009 article "Drug Companies & Doctors: A Story of Corruption", published in The New York Review of Books magazine, Angell wrote :[7]

...Similar conflicts of interest and biases exist in virtually every field of medicine, particularly those that rely heavily on drugs or devices. It is simply no longer possible to believe much of the clinical research that is published, or to rely on the judgment of trusted physicians or authoritative medical guidelines. I take no pleasure in this conclusion, which I reached slowly and reluctantly over my two decades as an editor of The New England Journal of Medicine .

Critic of the Food and Drug Administration[edit]

Commenting on the 1992 Prescription Drug User Fee Act which allowed the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to collect fees from drug manufacturers to fund the new drug approval process, Angell has stated :[8]

It's time to take the Food and Drug Administration back from the drug companies...In effect, the user fee act put the FDA on the payroll of the industry it regulates. Last year, the fees came to about $300 million, which the companies recoup many times over by getting their drugs to market faster.

Critic of U.S. healthcare system[edit]

Angell has long been a critic of the U.S. healthcare system. The American healthcare system is in serious crisis, she stated in a PBS special: "If we had set out to design the worst system that we could imagine, we couldn't have imagined one as bad as we have."[9] In the PBS interview, she urges the nation to scrap its failing healthcare system and start over:

Our health care system is based on the premise that health care is a commodity like VCRs or computers and that it should be distributed according to the ability to pay in the same way that consumer goods are. That's not what health care should be. Health care is a need; it's not a commodity, and it should be distributed according to need. If you're very sick, you should have a lot of it. If you're not sick, you shouldn't have a lot of it. But this should be seen as a personal, individual need, not as a commodity to be distributed like other marketplace commodities. That is a fundamental mistake in the way this country, and only this country, looks at health care. And that market ideology is what has made the health care system so dreadful, so bad at what it does.

Critic of the pharmaceutical industry[edit]

Angell is a critic of the pharmaceutical industry. With Arnold S. Relman, she argues, "The few drugs that are truly innovative have usually been based on taxpayer-supported research done in nonprofit academic medical centers or at the National Institutes of Health. In fact, many drugs now sold by drug companies were licensed to them by academic medical centers or small biotechnology companies." The pharmaceutical industry estimates that each new drug costs them $800 million to develop and bring to market, but Angell and Relman estimate the cost to them is actually closer to $100 million. Angell is the author of The Truth About the Drug Companies: How They Deceive Us and What to Do About It.

Angell's position has been challenged by Benjamin Zycher, former senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute, who argues that although research funded by the government produces excellent basic science and even early (and unusable) versions of drugs, private investment and industrial skills are needed to produce practical products. For instance, developing mass production methods (for erythropoietin), and developing drugs without limiting adverse effects (for antidepressive drugs), selecting which drugs to test in clinical trials, and funded the clinical trials, are most commonly done by industry - not in basic research labs funded by the government. [10]

In her 2004 article "The Truth About the Drug Companies", published in The New York Review of Books, Angell wrote :[11]

The combined profits for the ten drug companies in the Fortune 500 ($35.9 billion) were more than the profits for all the other 490 businesses put together ($33.7 billion) [in 2002]... Over the past two decades the pharmaceutical industry has moved very far from its original high purpose of discovering and producing useful new drugs. Now primarily a marketing machine to sell drugs of dubious benefit, this industry uses its wealth and power to co-opt every institution that might stand in its way, including the US Congress, the FDA, academic medical centers, and the medical profession itself. (Most of its marketing efforts are focused on influencing doctors, since they must write the prescriptions.) If prescription drugs were like ordinary consumer goods, all this might not matter very much. But drugs are different. People depend on them for their health and even their lives. In the words of Senator Debbie Stabenow (D-Mich.), “It’s not like buying a car or tennis shoes or peanut butter.” People need to know that there are some checks and balances on this industry, so that its quest for profits doesn’t push every other consideration aside. But there aren’t such checks and balances.

Richard Friedman, director of the psychopharmacology clinic at Weill Cornell Medical College, and a regular contributor to the New York Times science pages, criticized Angell's views as unbalanced. "Dr. Angell is now doing pretty much the same thing the industry she assails has done, just the converse. Pharma withheld the bad news about its drugs and touted the positive results; Dr. Angell ignores positive data that conflicts with her cherished theory and reports the negative results.”[12]

Thoughts on alternative medicine[edit]

Marcia Angell is also a critic of the current categorization of alternative medicine. In a 1998 NEJM editorial she wrote with Jerome Kassirer, they argued:

It is time for the scientific community to stop giving alternative medicine a free ride... There cannot be two kinds of medicine — conventional and alternative. There is only medicine that has been adequately tested and medicine that has not, medicine that works and medicine that may or may not work. Once a treatment has been tested rigorously, it no longer matters whether it was considered alternative at the outset. If it is found to be reasonably safe and effective, it will be accepted.[13]

WARNING THIS WILL BE LONG
Had a car accident in 85
Codeine was the pain med when I was release from hosp continuous use till 89
Given PROZAC by a specialist to help with nerve pain in my leg 89-90 not sure which year
Was not told a thing about it being a psych med thought it was a pain killer no info about psych side effects I went nuts had hallucinations. As I had a head injury and was diagnosed with a concussion in 85 I was sent to a head injury clinic in 1990 five years after the accident. I don't think they knew I had been on prozac I did not think it a big deal and never did finish the bottle of pills. I had tests of course lots of them. Was put into a pain clinic and given amitriptyline which stopped the withdrawal but had many side effects. But I could sleep something I had not done in a very long time the pain lessened. My mother got cancer in 94 they switched my meds to Zoloft to help deal with this pressure as I was her main care giver she died in 96. I stopped zoloft in 96 had withdrawal was put on paxil went nutty quit it ct put on resperidol quit it ct had withdrawal was put on Effexor... 2years later celexa was added 20mg then increased to 40mg huge personality change went wild. Did too fast taper off Celexa 05 as I felt unwell for a long time prior... quit Effexor 150mg ct 07 found ****** 8 months into withdrawal learned some things was banned from there in 08 have kept learning since. there is really not enough room here to put my history but I have a lot of opinions about a lot of things especially any of the drugs mentioned above.
One thing I would like to add here is this tidbit ALL OPIATES INCREASE SEROTONIN it is not a huge jump to being in chronic pain to being put on an ssri/snri and opiates will affect your antidepressants and your thinking.

As I do not update much I will put my quit date Nov. 17 2007 I quit Effexor cold turkey. 

http://survivingantidepressants.org/index.php?/topic/1096-introducing-myself-btdt/

There is a crack in everything ..That's how the light gets in :)

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Wow, Westcoast... Just wow. I don't even want to read the full study. The whole idea just makes me want to scream. How I wish it were possible to get ahold of the raw data!!

 

Seriously, are there any unbiased psych med studies that exist?  Don't want to sound like a conspiracy theorist but it doesn't seem that way.

Likely not, Compsport. Pharm are the only ones with enough funding to do these studies. Unfortunately there's probably very little to no financial motivation to study AD withdrawal, and lots of motivation not too prove its existence. Unless a pharm company w/o ties to one of the plethora of SSRI wants to create a "treatment" for withdrawal, what motivation do they have to prove its existence? Universities are too tied in with pharm, and independent researchers simply don't have the money. If Dr.s like Healy, Shipko, or Breggin had the financial resources I would bet they'd do the necessary studies in a heartbeat. Perhaps, if someone knows a student looking for ideas for their doctoral thesis/dissertation?... And want to pursue publication...It wouldn't be the scope we'd like to see, but it might be a start anyway.

 

We could crowd source funding... :) if one of them wanted to try.

WARNING THIS WILL BE LONG
Had a car accident in 85
Codeine was the pain med when I was release from hosp continuous use till 89
Given PROZAC by a specialist to help with nerve pain in my leg 89-90 not sure which year
Was not told a thing about it being a psych med thought it was a pain killer no info about psych side effects I went nuts had hallucinations. As I had a head injury and was diagnosed with a concussion in 85 I was sent to a head injury clinic in 1990 five years after the accident. I don't think they knew I had been on prozac I did not think it a big deal and never did finish the bottle of pills. I had tests of course lots of them. Was put into a pain clinic and given amitriptyline which stopped the withdrawal but had many side effects. But I could sleep something I had not done in a very long time the pain lessened. My mother got cancer in 94 they switched my meds to Zoloft to help deal with this pressure as I was her main care giver she died in 96. I stopped zoloft in 96 had withdrawal was put on paxil went nutty quit it ct put on resperidol quit it ct had withdrawal was put on Effexor... 2years later celexa was added 20mg then increased to 40mg huge personality change went wild. Did too fast taper off Celexa 05 as I felt unwell for a long time prior... quit Effexor 150mg ct 07 found ****** 8 months into withdrawal learned some things was banned from there in 08 have kept learning since. there is really not enough room here to put my history but I have a lot of opinions about a lot of things especially any of the drugs mentioned above.
One thing I would like to add here is this tidbit ALL OPIATES INCREASE SEROTONIN it is not a huge jump to being in chronic pain to being put on an ssri/snri and opiates will affect your antidepressants and your thinking.

As I do not update much I will put my quit date Nov. 17 2007 I quit Effexor cold turkey. 

http://survivingantidepressants.org/index.php?/topic/1096-introducing-myself-btdt/

There is a crack in everything ..That's how the light gets in :)

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What really burns me is they use what they have learned from people like us or us here in our posts... they use that information against us and to further their profits. 

 

WE PAY FOR THEIR PROFITS! THAT BURNS ME!

WARNING THIS WILL BE LONG
Had a car accident in 85
Codeine was the pain med when I was release from hosp continuous use till 89
Given PROZAC by a specialist to help with nerve pain in my leg 89-90 not sure which year
Was not told a thing about it being a psych med thought it was a pain killer no info about psych side effects I went nuts had hallucinations. As I had a head injury and was diagnosed with a concussion in 85 I was sent to a head injury clinic in 1990 five years after the accident. I don't think they knew I had been on prozac I did not think it a big deal and never did finish the bottle of pills. I had tests of course lots of them. Was put into a pain clinic and given amitriptyline which stopped the withdrawal but had many side effects. But I could sleep something I had not done in a very long time the pain lessened. My mother got cancer in 94 they switched my meds to Zoloft to help deal with this pressure as I was her main care giver she died in 96. I stopped zoloft in 96 had withdrawal was put on paxil went nutty quit it ct put on resperidol quit it ct had withdrawal was put on Effexor... 2years later celexa was added 20mg then increased to 40mg huge personality change went wild. Did too fast taper off Celexa 05 as I felt unwell for a long time prior... quit Effexor 150mg ct 07 found ****** 8 months into withdrawal learned some things was banned from there in 08 have kept learning since. there is really not enough room here to put my history but I have a lot of opinions about a lot of things especially any of the drugs mentioned above.
One thing I would like to add here is this tidbit ALL OPIATES INCREASE SEROTONIN it is not a huge jump to being in chronic pain to being put on an ssri/snri and opiates will affect your antidepressants and your thinking.

As I do not update much I will put my quit date Nov. 17 2007 I quit Effexor cold turkey. 

http://survivingantidepressants.org/index.php?/topic/1096-introducing-myself-btdt/

There is a crack in everything ..That's how the light gets in :)

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Share on other sites

Wow, Westcoast... Just wow. I don't even want to read the full study. The whole idea just makes me want to scream. How I wish it were possible to get ahold of the raw data!!

 

Seriously, are there any unbiased psych med studies that exist?  Don't want to sound like a conspiracy theorist but it doesn't seem that way.

Likely not, Compsport. Pharm are the only ones with enough funding to do these studies. Unfortunately there's probably very little to no financial motivation to study AD withdrawal, and lots of motivation not too prove its existence. Unless a pharm company w/o ties to one of the plethora of SSRI wants to create a "treatment" for withdrawal, what motivation do they have to prove its existence? Universities are too tied in with pharm, and independent researchers simply don't have the money. If Dr.s like Healy, Shipko, or Breggin had the financial resources I would bet they'd do the necessary studies in a heartbeat. Perhaps, if someone knows a student looking for ideas for their doctoral thesis/dissertation?... And want to pursue publication...It wouldn't be the scope we'd like to see, but it might be a start anyway.

 

Thanks Addax, I didn't think so.  Pretty discouraging.

Drug cocktail 1995 - 2010
Started taper of Adderall, Wellbutrin XL, Remeron, and Doxepin in 2006
Finished taper on June 10, 2010

Temazepam on a PRN basis approximately twice a month - 2014 to 2016

Beginning in 2017 - Consumption increased to about two times per week

April 2017 - Increased to taking it full time for insomnia

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The fact that the NYT ran a segment about getting off meds, and there seems to be more mention of it in Journals and such. Hell, just the fact that withdrawal is acknowledged at all now is leaps and bounds from where things were. What I'm saying is that I believe there is finally some movement, and movement that is slowly gaining momentum.

 

Getting the pharma companies to fund research or acknowledge there is a problem Could come to fruition If a pharm company realized a financial benefit of developing some kind of a tappering protocol (like a nicotine patch or something).

 

So things sound discouraging, but I think there is hope on the horizon.

1988-2012: Prozac @ 60mg (with a few stops and starts)

Fall 2012: Returned to 40mg after discontinuing and horrid withdrawal 

Fall 2013: 40mg Fluoxetine, added 150mg Wellbutrin to treat fatigue 

Winter 2014: Attempting to taper both (too fast)

April 2014: 9mg Fluoxetine + 37.5 Wellbutrin 

Summer 2014: 8 mg Fluoxetine + 0 Wellbutrin (way too fast a drop)

Late summer/Early Fall 2014: Debilitating Withdrawal symptoms 

Fall 2014 - Wellbutrin successfully kicked to the curb but…

Oct- Dec 2014: Panicked reinstatement of Fluoxetine ->30mg - held for 5yrs

Jan 2021: taper to 20mg Fluoxetine  then tapering by 1mg every 2-3 months

Fall 2022 - held at 10mg->December 2022: 9mg->Feb 2023: 8mg ->March 2023: brassmonkey slide begins: 7.8mg -> 7.6 -> 7.4->2 week hold (April)->7.2->7mg->6.8->2 week hold->6.6-> 1-month hold ->(June)-6.5->4-week hold-> (July)-6.4 (discontinued brassmonkey slide and slowed taper)-> (Aug)-6.2->(Sept)-6.0->(Oct)-5.9->(Nov)-5.8->(Dec)-5.7->wave!->(Jan)-5.8->(Feb)-6mg and holding.

 

My 2014 withdrawal experience: https://rxisk.org/antidepressant-withdrawal-a-prozac-story/

 

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yes, thats the notion, i feel.  the drug industry needs to feel sufficient pinch from journalism and social discontent to consider undercutting its current profits by admitting withdrawal exists in order to market new products aimed at more dependence and new sales/prescribing models.

 

it costs a lot to take something from R&D straight through trials and, most importantly, media campaigns that convince you its important, immediately helpful, and that their admission of guilt and contradiction in no way implies they are guilty or imperfect/unsuitable for diagnosing and medicating you into the distant future.

 

i think a change towards additional focus on the transitional difficulties will take another 30-50 years to fully manifest, and a move away from the psychotropic-dependence doctrine could take 80-100.  we were shoving the same **** down peoples throats 60 years ago, knowing the same risks and adverse reactions, and havent done much to change practice since then except hide the dangers more prodigiously and mark up the prices of increasingly newer and not-so-much improved medications.

 

journalism is starting to take bigger bites into the whole issue, as you mentioned and many here have noticed for the past several years.  i read even just today that a local news piece here on the polypharm doping of foster kids for profit (and rarely actual treatment) has won national awards and attention.  theres big money in approaching these issues from a more transgressive standpoint, for shock/sensationalistic value, of course, more than actual activism, but thats the nature of the media.  there are competing interests in the big picture, and while none of them are aligned with the interests of the suffering patients, there are enemies of our enemies, so to speak.

 

theres already patches for some psych drugs, though most require injections or sublinguals if you arent taking pills.  patches are a great way to alter distribution amount and timing (like customizing a taper pretty precisely, for instance), but many drugs dont tolerate such a form of administration technology.  i would really bet that there are already at least a few transitional drugs/drug plans being researched or developed by multiple pharmaceutical companies/labs presently.  they are savvy enough to plan in advance.

from 2005-2012, i spent 7 years taking 17 different psychotropic medications covering several classes.  i would be taking 3-7 medications at a time, and 6 out of the 17 medications listed below were maxed or overmaxed in clinical dosage before i moved on to trying the next unhelpful cocktail.
 
antidepressants (SSRIs, SNRIs, NDRIs, tetracyclics): zoloft, wellbutrin, effexor, lexapro, prozac, cymbalta, remeron
antipsychotics (atypical): abilify, zyprexa, risperdal, geodon
sleep aids (benzos, off-label antidepressants & antipsychotics, hypnotics): seroquel, temazepam, trazodone, ambien
anxiolytics: buspar
anticonvulsants: topamax
 
i tapered off all psychotropics from late 2011 through early 2013, one by one.  since quitting, ive been cycling through severe, disabling withdrawal symptoms spanning the gamut of the serious, less serious, and rather worrisome side effects of these assorted medications.  previous cross-tapering and medication or dosage changes had also caused undiagnosed withdrawal symptoms.
 
brainpan addlepation

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Please use the appropriate format for starting topics in Journals: Before you start a topic in Journals....

 

The Journals forum is for storing research articles for future reference.

This is not medical advice. Discuss any decisions about your medical care with a knowledgeable medical practitioner.

"It has become appallingly obvious that our technology has surpassed our humanity." -- Albert Einstein

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The fact that the NYT ran a segment about getting off meds, and there seems to be more mention of it in Journals and such. Hell, just the fact that withdrawal is acknowledged at all now is leaps and bounds from where things were. What I'm saying is that I believe there is finally some movement, and movement that is slowly gaining momentum.

 

Getting the pharma companies to fund research or acknowledge there is a problem Could come to fruition If a pharm company realized a financial benefit of developing some kind of a tappering protocol (like a nicotine patch or something).

 

So things sound discouraging, but I think there is hope on the horizon.

It has been years since wd has been acknowledged they done when it was put on the drug monograph so people could no longer sue them over withdrawal... it is acknowledged ... I am not as hopeful my wish is that your are right. 

WARNING THIS WILL BE LONG
Had a car accident in 85
Codeine was the pain med when I was release from hosp continuous use till 89
Given PROZAC by a specialist to help with nerve pain in my leg 89-90 not sure which year
Was not told a thing about it being a psych med thought it was a pain killer no info about psych side effects I went nuts had hallucinations. As I had a head injury and was diagnosed with a concussion in 85 I was sent to a head injury clinic in 1990 five years after the accident. I don't think they knew I had been on prozac I did not think it a big deal and never did finish the bottle of pills. I had tests of course lots of them. Was put into a pain clinic and given amitriptyline which stopped the withdrawal but had many side effects. But I could sleep something I had not done in a very long time the pain lessened. My mother got cancer in 94 they switched my meds to Zoloft to help deal with this pressure as I was her main care giver she died in 96. I stopped zoloft in 96 had withdrawal was put on paxil went nutty quit it ct put on resperidol quit it ct had withdrawal was put on Effexor... 2years later celexa was added 20mg then increased to 40mg huge personality change went wild. Did too fast taper off Celexa 05 as I felt unwell for a long time prior... quit Effexor 150mg ct 07 found ****** 8 months into withdrawal learned some things was banned from there in 08 have kept learning since. there is really not enough room here to put my history but I have a lot of opinions about a lot of things especially any of the drugs mentioned above.
One thing I would like to add here is this tidbit ALL OPIATES INCREASE SEROTONIN it is not a huge jump to being in chronic pain to being put on an ssri/snri and opiates will affect your antidepressants and your thinking.

As I do not update much I will put my quit date Nov. 17 2007 I quit Effexor cold turkey. 

http://survivingantidepressants.org/index.php?/topic/1096-introducing-myself-btdt/

There is a crack in everything ..That's how the light gets in :)

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It has been years since wd has been acknowledged they done when it was put on the drug monograph so people could no longer sue them over withdrawal... it is acknowledged ... I am not as hopeful my wish is that your are right.

I meant acknowledged in popular media. I'm not suggesting it's something that will happen yesterday, but even the fact that there are warnings about "stopping the drug suddenly" and blackbox labels is a good sign given that those are relatively recent. It took sometime for things to crash down on the tobacco companies, but it did and continues to while companies found financial incentive to creat things like nicotine gums, nicotine patches, and now e-cigs.

 

People have to become aware first and the audience has to become bigger, which is why people like Healy, Breggin, Shipko and Alto are so important. I just wish there was more money to get them bigger megaphones.

 

I was joking the other day about applying for a research grant from the church of Scientology because they are notoriously anti-psychiatry. Unfortunately their backing could, well... Cause credibility of the study to be questioned. Particularly after the recent HBO documentary. Yikes!

 

I think I'm right btdt. Just like so many other battles, once the rumblings start and persist they pick up momentum. Sometimes slowly... But still surely.

1988-2012: Prozac @ 60mg (with a few stops and starts)

Fall 2012: Returned to 40mg after discontinuing and horrid withdrawal 

Fall 2013: 40mg Fluoxetine, added 150mg Wellbutrin to treat fatigue 

Winter 2014: Attempting to taper both (too fast)

April 2014: 9mg Fluoxetine + 37.5 Wellbutrin 

Summer 2014: 8 mg Fluoxetine + 0 Wellbutrin (way too fast a drop)

Late summer/Early Fall 2014: Debilitating Withdrawal symptoms 

Fall 2014 - Wellbutrin successfully kicked to the curb but…

Oct- Dec 2014: Panicked reinstatement of Fluoxetine ->30mg - held for 5yrs

Jan 2021: taper to 20mg Fluoxetine  then tapering by 1mg every 2-3 months

Fall 2022 - held at 10mg->December 2022: 9mg->Feb 2023: 8mg ->March 2023: brassmonkey slide begins: 7.8mg -> 7.6 -> 7.4->2 week hold (April)->7.2->7mg->6.8->2 week hold->6.6-> 1-month hold ->(June)-6.5->4-week hold-> (July)-6.4 (discontinued brassmonkey slide and slowed taper)-> (Aug)-6.2->(Sept)-6.0->(Oct)-5.9->(Nov)-5.8->(Dec)-5.7->wave!->(Jan)-5.8->(Feb)-6mg and holding.

 

My 2014 withdrawal experience: https://rxisk.org/antidepressant-withdrawal-a-prozac-story/

 

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I like the crowd-funding idea

2009: Cancer hospital said I had adjustment disorder because I thought they were doing it wrong. Their headshrinker prescribed Effexor, and my life set on a new course. I didn't know what was ahead, like a passenger on Disneyland's Matterhorn, smiling and waving as it climbs...clink, clink, clink.

2010: Post surgical accidental Effexor discontinuation by nurses, masked by intravenous Dilaudid. (The car is balanced at the top of the track.) I get home, pop a Vicodin, and ...

Whooosh...down, down, down, down, down...goes the trajectory of my life, up goes my mood and tendency to think everything is a good idea.
2012: After the bipolar jig was up, now a walking bag of unrelated symptoms, I went crazy on Daytrana (the Ritalin skin patch by Noven), because ADHD was a perfect fit for a bag of unrelated symptoms. I was prescribed Effexor for the nervousness of it, and things got neurological. An EEG showed enough activity to warrant an epilepsy diagnosis rather than non-epileptic ("psychogenic") seizures.

:o 2013-2014: Quit everything and got worse. I probably went through DAWS: dopamine agonist withdrawal syndrome. I drank to not feel, but I felt a lot: dread, fear, regret, grief: an utter sense of total loss of everything worth breathing about, for almost two years.

I was not suicidal but I wanted to be dead, at least dead to the experience of my own brain and body.

2015: I  began to recover after adding virgin coconut oil and organic grass-fed fed butter to a cup of instant coffee in the morning.

I did it hoping for mental acuity and better memory. After ten days of that, I was much better, mood-wise. Approximately neutral.

And, I experienced drowsiness. I could sleep. Not exactly happy, I did 30 days on Wellbutrin, because it had done me no harm in the past. 

I don't have the DAWS mood or state of mind. It never feel like doing anything if it means standing up.

In fact, I don't especially like moving. I'm a brain with a beanbag body.   :unsure:

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Although, this post is about a journal article be stored for future reference. the discussion became broader, but the article belongs under this topic, for sure. Not sure what to do.

2009: Cancer hospital said I had adjustment disorder because I thought they were doing it wrong. Their headshrinker prescribed Effexor, and my life set on a new course. I didn't know what was ahead, like a passenger on Disneyland's Matterhorn, smiling and waving as it climbs...clink, clink, clink.

2010: Post surgical accidental Effexor discontinuation by nurses, masked by intravenous Dilaudid. (The car is balanced at the top of the track.) I get home, pop a Vicodin, and ...

Whooosh...down, down, down, down, down...goes the trajectory of my life, up goes my mood and tendency to think everything is a good idea.
2012: After the bipolar jig was up, now a walking bag of unrelated symptoms, I went crazy on Daytrana (the Ritalin skin patch by Noven), because ADHD was a perfect fit for a bag of unrelated symptoms. I was prescribed Effexor for the nervousness of it, and things got neurological. An EEG showed enough activity to warrant an epilepsy diagnosis rather than non-epileptic ("psychogenic") seizures.

:o 2013-2014: Quit everything and got worse. I probably went through DAWS: dopamine agonist withdrawal syndrome. I drank to not feel, but I felt a lot: dread, fear, regret, grief: an utter sense of total loss of everything worth breathing about, for almost two years.

I was not suicidal but I wanted to be dead, at least dead to the experience of my own brain and body.

2015: I  began to recover after adding virgin coconut oil and organic grass-fed fed butter to a cup of instant coffee in the morning.

I did it hoping for mental acuity and better memory. After ten days of that, I was much better, mood-wise. Approximately neutral.

And, I experienced drowsiness. I could sleep. Not exactly happy, I did 30 days on Wellbutrin, because it had done me no harm in the past. 

I don't have the DAWS mood or state of mind. It never feel like doing anything if it means standing up.

In fact, I don't especially like moving. I'm a brain with a beanbag body.   :unsure:

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A mod can give the link to the journal article and move the rest to a new thread... but only a mod can do it.. makes more work for them tho.I am not even going to attempt to think up a title with my sqeeky brain today... again passing the buck.

peace

WARNING THIS WILL BE LONG
Had a car accident in 85
Codeine was the pain med when I was release from hosp continuous use till 89
Given PROZAC by a specialist to help with nerve pain in my leg 89-90 not sure which year
Was not told a thing about it being a psych med thought it was a pain killer no info about psych side effects I went nuts had hallucinations. As I had a head injury and was diagnosed with a concussion in 85 I was sent to a head injury clinic in 1990 five years after the accident. I don't think they knew I had been on prozac I did not think it a big deal and never did finish the bottle of pills. I had tests of course lots of them. Was put into a pain clinic and given amitriptyline which stopped the withdrawal but had many side effects. But I could sleep something I had not done in a very long time the pain lessened. My mother got cancer in 94 they switched my meds to Zoloft to help deal with this pressure as I was her main care giver she died in 96. I stopped zoloft in 96 had withdrawal was put on paxil went nutty quit it ct put on resperidol quit it ct had withdrawal was put on Effexor... 2years later celexa was added 20mg then increased to 40mg huge personality change went wild. Did too fast taper off Celexa 05 as I felt unwell for a long time prior... quit Effexor 150mg ct 07 found ****** 8 months into withdrawal learned some things was banned from there in 08 have kept learning since. there is really not enough room here to put my history but I have a lot of opinions about a lot of things especially any of the drugs mentioned above.
One thing I would like to add here is this tidbit ALL OPIATES INCREASE SEROTONIN it is not a huge jump to being in chronic pain to being put on an ssri/snri and opiates will affect your antidepressants and your thinking.

As I do not update much I will put my quit date Nov. 17 2007 I quit Effexor cold turkey. 

http://survivingantidepressants.org/index.php?/topic/1096-introducing-myself-btdt/

There is a crack in everything ..That's how the light gets in :)

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Do not start a topic here unless it is in the proper format. See Before you start a topic in Journals....

 

The title is the title of the first journal article.

 

Do not make more work for me or the mods in this forum, or you will be invited not to start topics in this forum at all.

This is not medical advice. Discuss any decisions about your medical care with a knowledgeable medical practitioner.

"It has become appallingly obvious that our technology has surpassed our humanity." -- Albert Einstein

All postings © copyrighted.

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