Today's Fresh Blogs...

• Lack of posts

  Published: August 4, 2007, 3:05 pm

  Tags: Medicine Medication, Personal Thoughts, Lamictal, Medication, Pregnancy

  of our concerns down to the medication issue. I've been doing really well on the Lamictal, but there are warnings all over the prescription that say "Do not take while pregnant." My doctor's pretty much, "You need to outweight the benefits vs. the risks." He said there's a slightly increased chance of my kid developing a

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• Lack of posts

  Published: August 4, 2007, 3:05 pm

  Tags: Medicine Medication, Personal Thoughts, Lamictal, Medication, Pregnancy

  of our concerns down to the medication issue. I've been doing really well on the Lamictal, but there are warnings all over the prescription that say "Do not take while pregnant." My doctor's pretty much, "You need to outweight the benefits vs. the risks." He said there's a slightly increased chance of my kid developing a

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• College shooting: Part 45,656

  Published: February 15, 2008, 5:42 pm

  Tags: Medicine Medication, Mental Illness, News, Suicide, Kazmierczak, Niu, Northern Illinois, School Shootings

  he "stopped taking [his] medication." It appears that he had no record of mental illness at all. He applied for and legally obtained a gun after a background check. The issue of mental illness in these school shootings is constantly brought up. While I don't dismiss the unstable mental health of Cho or Kazmierczak, I can't help but wonder

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• College shooting: Part 45,656

  Published: February 15, 2008, 5:42 pm

  Tags: Medicine Medication, Mental Illness, News, Suicide, Kazmierczak, Niu, Northern Illinois, School Shootings

  "stopped taking [his] medication." It appears that he had no record of mental illness at all. He applied for and legally obtained a gun after a background check. The issue of mental illness in these school shootings is constantly brought up. While I don't dismiss the unstable mental health of Cho or Kazmierczak, I can't help but

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• Brief update on Singulair-suicide link

  Published: March 27, 2008, 4:27 pm

  Tags: Medicine Medication, Suicide, Allergy, Allergy Medication, Asthma, Clinical Trials, Drug, Drugs, Fda, Inhaler, Investigation, Medication, Medications Com, Meds, Merck, Montelukast, Patient Safety, Patient Safety Information, Patients, Prescribing Information, Press Releas

  the Singulair section of medications.com is ablaze with parents who are now expressing concern over their children's well-being on the drug. Apparently, issues have cropped up with the drug even before the FDA announced their

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• Singulair and Suicidal Behavior

  Published: March 27, 2008, 12:13 pm

  Tags: Medicine Medication, Suicide, Allergy Medication, Anxiety, Depression, Drugs, Fda, Investigation, Medication, Meds, Montelukast, Mood Changes, Patient Information, Patient Safety, Safety Information, Singulair, Suicidal, Suicidal Actions, Suicidal Behavior, Suicidal Thought

  me to think about an allergy medication being linked to suicidal behavior. The FDA also says that it could cause mood and behavior changes. The situation that alerted the FDA to this possibility is the story of 15-year-old Cody Miller who killed himself 17 days after switching from allergy medication Allegra to Singulair. Miller's mother, Kate,

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• NYTimes

  Published: April 15, 2008, 9:01 pm

  Tags: Depression, Medicine Medication, Mental Illness, Suicide, Antidepressants, Drugs, Friedman, Medication, New York Times, Nyt, Nytimes, Patients, Psych Drugs, Psych Meds, Psychiatric, Psychiatry, Psychological, Psychology, Richard Friedman

  "The drugs save lives, and we often have no choice but to use them even if we have questions about their long-term use. But the questions are big ones, and we owe it to our patients to try to answer them." Dr. Richard Friedman, a frequent mental health columnist for the New York Times, has written a piece that questions the use of

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• Pittman, Zoloft, and akathisia revisited

  Published: April 14, 2008, 10:21 pm

  Tags: Medicine Medication, News, Adverse Effects, Akathisia, Christopher Pittman, Cnn, Drugs, Fda, Grandparents, Hearing, Homicide, Medications, Meds, Mental Health, Mental Illness, Murder, Paroxetine, Paxil, Pfizer, Pittman, Post Marketing Adverse Events, Psych Drugs, Psych Meds

  you take prescription medicine doesn't mean you can't be held accountable for your actions."Platt's right. I'm not familiar with the specifics of the trial and I don't know how far an insanity plea might have gone. I don't think Pittman was "insane," but for his age and the medication he'd been taking, Pittman really should have been

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• Neurontin 0, Placebo 1. Pfizer loses, Placebo wins.

  Published: April 21, 2008, 5:14 am

  Tags: Bipolar Disorder, Medicine Medication, Mental Illness, Weblogs, Articles, Bipolar, Bipolar Disorder, Echo Chamber Effect, Epilepsy, Fierce Pharma, Gabapentin, Journals, Neurontin, Off Label Usage, Pfizer, Soulful Sepulcher, Tim Carey, Wsj Blog

  Stephany at soulful sepulcher has a post up on how Neurontin has not shown itself to be more effective for bipolar disorder than placebo in clinical trials. It's actually kind of funny that this discovery has been made in April 2008 because I'd reported on this back in January of 2007:So let's recap: gabapentin is FDA-approved for epilepsy

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• Wyeth reps no like Pristiq

  Published: April 21, 2008, 3:44 am

  Tags: Medicine Medication, Weblogs, Carlat, Carlat Psychiatry Blog, Desvenlafaxine, Drug Reps, Drugs, Effexor Xr, Marketing, Medication, Meds, Passion, People, Performance, Pristiq, Psych Drugs, Psychiatry, Slogans, Venlafaxine, Wyeth

  Oof. I'm just starting to read The Carlat Psychiatry Blog and stumbled upon this post about Wyeth drug reps trashing Pristiq. Wow. Carlat pulled an excerpt of a Wyeth rep mocking Pristiq's new marketing slogan: "People, Passion, Performance... Pristiq!""PEOPLE - 1/2 of you will be gone in less than 27 days PASSION - There is no passion now, but

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• Loose Screws Mental Health News

  Published: April 22, 2008, 9:26 pm

  Tags: Medicine Medication, Mental Illness, News, Anti Smoking, Antismoking Pill, Chantix, Drugs, Medication, Mental Health, Mental Illness, Mentally Ill, Niu, Safety, Steven Kazmierczak, Tac, Violence, Violent Acts

  Anti-smoking pill drug Chantix has been linked to mental illness, according to Attorney Daily. Chantix's safety is currently under fire, as similar stories of patients with suicidal thoughts, depression and aggressive behavior surface. The FDA received reports of 37 suicides and 491 cases in which people had suicidal thoughts. The FDA also said it

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• Wyeth Pushing Pristiq Hard

  Published: April 22, 2008, 1:51 pm

  Tags: Medicine Medication, American Home Products, Antidepressant, Astrazeneca, Cnn Money, Cost, Desvenlafaxine, Discount, Drug, Drugs, Effexor, Effexor Xr, Eli Lilly, Fluoxetine, Heartburn Drug, Insurance, Insurance Companies, Medication, Meds, Patients, Pfizer, Prilosec, Pristiq

  The Wall Street Journal reports that Wyeth, desperate to make money off of its Effexor XR-knockoff, Pristiq, says it will slash the antidepressant at a 20% discount compared to Effexor's price. The price slash, CNN money reports, is a result of less-than-impressive clinical trial data on Pristiq's "safety and effectiveness."Wyeth SVP Joe Mahady

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• Gone but I don't know where

  Published: April 27, 2008, 1:31 am

  Tags: Bipolar Disorder, Depression, Medicine Medication, Mood Rating, Personal Thoughts, Suicide, Adrenal Fatigue, Adverse Effect, Angry, Bipolar, Bipolar Disorder, Depressed, Depression, Depressive, Drugs, Exhausted, Father, Impulse, Lamictal, Lamotrigine, Mania, Manic, Medication

  some people do well without medication, right? Maybe after all my counseling, I can do well too. I don't know. Who is Marissa without medication? Have I lived the past year of my life as Marissa's twin--a lookalike but a different personality? I don't know. Will I begin my mixed-mood episodes again off the medication? I don't know. I've had one

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• The Effexor Chronicles: Lucky Her

  Published: April 30, 2008, 5:18 pm

  Tags: Medicine Medication, Weblogs, Adverse Effects, Effexor, Side Effects, Venlafaxine, Withdrawal, Withdrawal Symptoms

  2 weeks after stopping the medication. I am proud to say I am now completly effexer free, with no side affects any longer. It can be done. Just go slow ! Good luck.

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• Great editorial in NYTimes

  Published: April 29, 2008, 10:59 pm

  Tags: Medicine Medication, Opinion Editorial, Ban, Doctors, Drug Companies, Drug Reps, Editorial, Ghostwriting, Industry, Medical Schools, New York Times, Nyt, Nytimes, Patients, Proposal, Restrictions, Treatment

  The New York Times published a great editorial supporting a ban on much of the lavish treatment that doctors get from drug reps. If adopted by medical schools, restrictions would include: Ban on personal gifts, industry-supplied foods and meals, free travel (not reimbursed for services), and payment for attending industry-sponsored meetings

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