Is there ANY positive things to say about Cipralex??

[Dazo]

I have been prescribed cipralex, i am fighting with bad anxiety almost 24/7 every day.

Some year ago i took sertaline and it was awful, made me worse.

I hope i can get some feedback here, hopefully some positive experiences, it seems almost only bad things to read.

Thanks in advance!!

Daniel

[reallyfedup]

I have been taking it for a week. Took cital 40mg for 4 months before this and seroxat 11 years before that. Its newer and expensive with few side effects. I have anxiety panic and depression and am housebound so you are not the only one!!!

[bab]

hi you two

i know its hard to believe in the beginning, but once the side effects go they are very good. They also have less side effects than other drugs x

[Dazo]

Thanks, both of you!

Has anyone have cipralex for a while? I mean, did it help againt the anxiety?

I am a little scared taking them, it seems like very many negative posts about it.

[alias_kev]

Hey Dazo. I was given Escitalopram (= Cipralex) last year (about Aug?) as the GP reckoned I had depression on top of the stress I had semi-officially suffered for a long time. I also had a CBT course. In that time frame I self-diagnosed my GAD (and looking back I would have got 20/21 on NHS's "have you got GAD?" Test). So the GP had made a good choice as Esc' claims effectiveness against GAD whereas only the NHS claims it for many SSRIs.

So anyway I had longterm GAD (exhibited as stress in public) which had become stronger and generated some phobias too. I then has a lot of sadness about my aging parents in the middle of the year which dumped depression over the top.

The Esc' completely removed the depression - given time - and I was sos blocked that I did not even feel much emotion when my Father died in November. So very effective against the depression. The anxiety only fell to about 17/21 on NHS GAD test (at best), and I spent a lot of the time on the maximum dose of 20mg daily.

My guess is that Esc is very effective on the depression - and anecdotes on the web imply that its more effective and has less side effects than Citalopram (its much cheaper cousin). Against the anxiety I think it may do best if you have light to medium GAD whereas I had and retained severe GAD.

I am currently experimenting with Buspirone for the anxiety - it is not an anti-depresant nor an SSRI. I have a post in the forum "alternatives to escitalopram" which asked and summarised about alternatives to Esc' as my PCT wanted the GP to stop prescribing it!

[Dazo]

Thanks Kevin;

i guess there is a thin line between depression and anxiety.
I dont have any depression, of course sometimes i get depressed when the anxiety is ruin to much.

I just hope that someone who has bad anxiety can say something good about this, that it really helps.

I have benzos to use but i guess its not a good solution for a long while.

Daniel

[bab]

Hi Dazo
I dont suffer depression, just anxiety. It doesnt take away the anxiety completely but it definately helps you to cope with it.

[NoPoet]

Read up on inositol, which you can get from Holland and Barretts. Preliminary trials show it is as effective as any SSRI. In other trials it reduced the number of panic attacks people experienced much more quickly than SSRIs. Inositol is a naturally occuring substance and does not give any side effects. Try it if your latest medication proves too harsh.

[reallyfedup]

thanks from me also x I get depressed about the anxiety never going too! Its a double edged sword for sure!?!?

[alias_kev]

As I said the Esc' did help me BUT it only really took the peak out of the GAD symptoms, and that was with 20mg. The same week I was going to ask the GP what else he could recommend/try to get a stronger effect it turned out our PCT wanted him to stop using Esc' and use the much cheaper Citalopram. They treat the two as identical even though most of the official claims made Esc' are not made for Cit', and its documented that the 50% R-Citalopram in Cit' produces side effects WITHOUT beneficial effect!

On that basis I scoured the web information and have a thread "Alternatives to Escitalopram" that includes what I found. Other than the 'azepams the only confirmed anxiety meds were: Buspirone (almost ignored these days) and Venlafaxine (now hated by the americans).

From taking it the Buspirone is fairly subtle especially at 3x5mg and chemically relies on a simple interaction with your serotonin cycle, different from the SSRIs. Its a Serotonin partial-agonist. Thus reports of no effect, especially from americans who seem to often be prescribed it for non-GAD anxiety disorders.

From reading the Venlafaxine is also a serotonin manipulator (like SSRIs and buspirone) BUT ALSO manipulates norepinephrine another key brain chemical. So its a serotonin-norepinephrine reuptake inhibitor (SNRI). So its not surprising it can do different things (good and bad). Oddly this was a favourite in the USA in 2004 and but is now less liked. Ofcourse almost all this info relates to its use in Depression. Although many people receive this and the SSRIs for anxiety disorders - most information and claims actually relate to the treatment of depression. So it may even be that it is indeed now a lesser anti-depressant BUT might have stronger anxiolytic effect. God knows if we will ever know for sure. Its worse problems seem - too my reading - to lie in withdrawal. It may be tough like the 'azepams but hopefully without their "fast hit" addictive properties.

It really would be nice if they'd look at any medications as anxiety specifics rather than cross-prescribing anti-depressants on a "probably work" basis. It seems to me the medical establishment (choose to) confuse sadness with fear which is odd as one is the opposite of happyness part of social-emotions and the other is part of fight-or-flight a defense mechanism. Even evolutionally they fulfill very different purposes. Fear is to me a far simpler and more primitive emotion than happyness/sadness.