Atavan and Ritalin

[Duker52]

Hospice came yesterday and prescribed Atavan for anxiety and Ritalin to help with fatigue. I have not found any recent posts on either of these two drugs and was wondering if anyone is taking them. I'm interested to know if they help and if you experienced any side effects. Any comments would be appreciated.

Bill

 

[ShiftKicker]

Hi Bill-

I tried Ritalin (and Modafinil) for fatigue last year. The Ritalin did nothing for me as far as usable energy went, but did cause agitation, irritability and hand tremors. The Ativan my help you balance the agitation from the Ritalin though, so I hope it works for you. Mind you, everyone responds differently to drugs, so I am in hope this is a solution for fatigue for you.

Fiona

 

[affected]

Bill Atavan is very commonly taken for anxiety and most PALS or CALS report it works very well. Of course there are always some people who find any drug either doesn't work so well for them or have a reaction, but this is generally well tolerated.

Ritalin - I have heard on a CALS forum I belong to that it is used, but I have not heard much about it. Ritalin usually works by giving very good focus (many years ago greyhound racers would illegally give it to their dogs), and is used in ADD. Hopefully others who know of its use in ALS will have something to say about it's effectiveness or not.

 

[pittsburghgal]

Hi, Bill.

My husband, Frank, takes Ativan for anxiety at bedtime. He was having bad anxiety episodes at night and felt like there was not enough air in the room for him to breathe. The Ativan does help him a lot. He does not seem to have any side effects.

Sharon

 

[KimT]

If one does not have ADHD or ADD, Ritalin can give you a lot of jittery feelings. Lots of my students took it to study and they ended up losing focus with anxiety rather than increasing focus.

Atavan did nothing for me. The only two benzos that work for me are xanax (works great for general anxiety and panic) and Valium (IMO one of the best muscle relaxants ever.) I know some will disagree with me but I've tried all the benzos for panic and general anxiety.

 

[lgelb]

The combination of an upper and downer [essentially] makes little sense to me. If fatigue is a concern, I would minimize the lorazepam to what you need for comfort, assuming you asked for help with anxiety.

 

[Atsugi]

I was just about to say that, too, Laurie. Makes no sense to me, but a lot of people on the internet are doing it. I see lots of different reactions to the combination. Some report they love it, some hate it, and most folks say there's no danger. Seems like different people have different reactions to these drugs.

Bill, if your doctor prescribed them, take them, but with caution. Best with food.

 

[lgelb]

In hospice, it's not an accountable doc that necessarily writes things. The nurses, who, like docs, may be good, bad or indifferent, have considerable autonomy.

Nor does the yellow + blue=green paradigm hold true with drugs, and people die of ill-advised combinations written by docs, quite frequently containing stimulants and anxiolytics, every day.

I would never take a benzo (lorazepam in this case) without a clear indication, least of all on a regular schedule, and you will see plenty of warnings on the label itself to that effect.