I trust my dr, but is my med cocktail frying my liver???!


Question:

I trust my dr, but is my med cocktail frying my liver???

i am 38 yr old F poster child for bpd...with major depressive disorder.....from my psych i take 120mg cymbalta, 300mg wellbutrin, 100mcg levothyroxine sod, 2mg clonazepam, weaning off 200mg seroquel, beginning slowly up to 100mg lamictalfrom other drs. meloxicam 15mg, skelaxin 800mg 4x, hydroco/apap 7.5-500, and maxide 75-50mg i realize via my counselor, that i will most likely be on mental meds the rest of my life..... the pain meds i just started for development of arthiritis in my lower back.....that was first diagnoses.... i will follow up on that.... except for a low low cycle and i self help myself, that is alot of meds right? shlould i be passing on sooner than average?


Answers:

Maybe not everyone noticed that "other drs." in your story. You're on multiple meds in part because you see multiple doctors for multiple problems. You're maintained on 4 psych meds, now switching from the antipsychotic Seroquel to the mood stabilizer Lamictal. I assume you've been diagnosed as bipolar, unless you have epilepsy in addition to your psychiatric condition. If bpd means borderline personality disorder then you have that, too.

You are on 2 antidepressants that work in different ways in Cymbalta and Wellbutrin. Are they working? You are on an antianxiety agent in Klonopin. Then there's one more for your bipolar disorder. That's not strange. Bipolars are often on 3 meds. One more is not strange.

Anyone on medications needs to have their liver enzymes checked occasionally. If yours are OK, there's no reason to worry about your liver. I've seen people on a lot more medications than this and needing everyone of them. When I was in practice I used to joke that we doctors should really stop at the best 12 meds for someone, but that was a joke. Why is it customers of health food stores will buy even more chemicals than 12 and not worry the least about adding that to the millions of chemicals already in their bodies, but some patients receiving more than a couple of prescriptions worry so? I suppose it's those lists of side effects. For the most part side effects aren't hidden. If you are having side effects talk to your doctors about changing things. You should see the lists of potential side effects from water and air!

Patients are rarely on the perfect regimen of medications for them. There's always something to try differently. If you want a second opinion, go get one. As someone who used to give second opinions, I'd usually find something to do differently. I can't here because I don't know a thing beyond what you wrote, and who knows if those diagnoses are correct? The fact that you're seeing multiple doctors plus a counselor means these professionals are a check on each other doing something strange. I don't see anything strange myself.

I'm significantly older than you are, with multiple diagnoses myself. I take at least 6 meds each day, just one of them a psych med, lithium, which I've taken for 25 years. A couple of others are for conditions I had by my twenties. The rest started in recent years. If you don't die things will come up that medicines help. It's been that way for a long time.

I don't see any reason to think you have a reduced life expectancy, so get used to it.




The consumer health information on answer-health.com is for informational purposes only and is not a substitute for medical advice or treatment for any medical conditions.
The answer content post by the user, if contains the copyright content please contact us, we will immediately remove it.
Copyright © 2007-2011 answer-health.com -   Terms of Use -   Contact us

Health Categories