Question about Venlafaxine

[AGJ90]

Hi everyone

Just a quick quick question, maybe no one will be able to answer, but will ask anyway.

Venlafaxine is an SNRI which mean serotonin and norepinephrine, reuptake inhibitor, meaning it increases concentrations of these neurotransmitters in the brain. Why do doctors prescribe this for anxiety, even though its indicated for anxiety? norepinephrine is involved in the fight or flight response we get when we feel anxious, so why would we need more of this transmitter to keep anxiety at bay? surely increasing this will cause heightened anxiety?

Maybe I'm looking too much into it, but would love to know the answer from any med geeks.

Thanks.

[MyNameIsTerry]

I think you will want somewhere like Drugsforum as they seem to get into the technical stuff behind many drugs.

Whilst SSRI's & SNRI's increase the relevant neurotransmitter in the gap they also reduce the number of receptor sites, plugging the gaps I think.

I know my SNRI, Duloxetine, also has a small impact on Dopamine in the pre frontal cortex via inhibiting norepinephrine reuptake. So, talk about confusing as it's actually cutting down on what it is trying to increase but only in that area!

The noradrenaline system works with various things other than anxiety e.g. circadian rhythm (mine has gor much worse since started my SNRI), hunger (hence why I get quite hungry when I'm suffering adrenaline spikes), rate & depth of breathing (maybe why I feel so tired sometimes it's an effort to breath or at least it feels that way), etc.

I'm with you on this, I don't understand the importance of increasing this when it comes to anxiety. I can see the point with depression but not a disorder heavily based on having too much too often already! However, we have people on here taking SNRI's and finding their anxiety is better. From my own experience I found Citalopram helpful and Duloxetine barely helpful & more likely causing side effects for symptoms I can't even remember having before I went on it (let alone the OCD explosion for someone who only had traits with their GAD before)

[MrAndy]

http://www.crazymeds.us/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Meds/Effexor

[MyNameIsTerry]

http://www.crazymeds.us/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Meds/Effexor

and feel like you’re wearing an electric eel for a hat after dinner every night

I had to laugh at that!

[MrAndy]

I like crazy meds reviews they are quite honest and funny from.people who have actually taken the drugs