Posted by Rathrbfishn on May 4, 2002, at 21:46:43
In reply to Depression/Anxiety..what works?-confused and dazed, posted by johnj on May 4, 2002, at 19:39:06
From your post it sounds like to me you need to get an appropriate diagnosis. If you have depression secondary to anxiety then you need to treat the anxiety. I know most docs like to add AD's when a patient presents with anxiety. But if you had anxiety first you should treat that and see if the depression doesn't remit. My experience with AD's has been that they ALL enhance my anxiety. I prefer tranxene, but my pdoc say's the best med for anxiety is xanax. And xanax has been proven to have some AD affects. I have pd and am on monotherapy with xanax. It works well for me. I have no depression, though my pdoc wanted me to try all the AD's at first, and I tried most. I have insomnia as well, not anxiety based, but usually just put up with it. Occasionally I take a small dose of doxepine, a sedating TCA. I try not to take it unless I just have to get good sleep, because I pay for it the next day with increased anxiety. 7.5mgs of tranxene is not much if you have an anxiety disorder. When I visit my pdoc he always asks how the anxiety is. Sometimes it's fine and others not so good. His response is that if I'm having anxiety, take more xanax. When the anxiety calms down, I taper slowly back down to my maintenance dose. Slow tapering of any psycotropic drug is the key to avoiding withdrawal problems. Good luck with your decision.
poster:Rathrbfishn
thread:105090
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20020503/msgs/105093.html