Clusterheadaches.com Message Board


    
      
        Clusterheadaches.com Message Board
        (http://www.clusterheadaches.com/cgi-bin/yabb/YaBB.cgi)
      

        New Message Board Archives >> Medications, Treatments, Therapies 2004 >> Please help.  Verapamil question.
        
(Message started by: eyes_afire on May 24^th, 2004, 6:01pm)

Title: Please help. Verapamil question.
Post by eyes_afire on May 24^th, 2004, 6:01pm

Hi folks. I find myself in a strange situation. Please understand that I'm not asking for medical advice, but rather for information and personal experience.

Background: My neuro's office seems to be undergoing a bit of reorganization and incidentally my CH's are worsening and maybe verapamil is failing a bit as evidenced by my 2am skullcrushing. I requested to increase my verapamil SR to 360 mg. Unfortunately, I've had to converse with the ubiquitous 'physicians assistant'. Anyhow, he authorized the prescription for verapamil immediate release which I have never taken before. I questioned it (thinking it was a mistake), but it seems that the office believes that the immediate release is more appropriate for CH. Of course, I'm very glad to see that the doc is up-to-date on CH treatments and I can see many advantages to using the immediate release formulation. But...

I think I read on this message board that SR should be tapered before starting immediate release due to safety concerns (but I'm not sure). 'Physicians assistant' thinks I can just change over without taper because my current dose isn't that large.

Question: Does anyone have information that changing formulations without tapering would be risky? For those who have changed formulations, did you taper first?

thanks in advance

--- Steve

Title: Re: Please help. Verapamil question.
Post by kissmyglass on May 24^th, 2004, 6:33pm

Hi Steve,
I think it's the SR that we need. Think you need to taper off it to quit, not sure about switching over....

Kev

Title: Re: Please help. Verapamil question.
Post by Ueli on May 24^th, 2004, 7:16pm

Hi eyes,

Verapamil SR takes about 6 hours until a tablet is fully resorbed. So, if you would change over without a break, there would be a short (~1 day) peak. If you have no heart and BP problems this is probably of no consequence, especially as you are on a rather low dose of the RS version.
If you end the RS with half the dose for one day and then start the regular the next day with a half dose too, you will probably be on the safe side.
(Recently Roxy changed from a too low dose extended to a too low dose of regularand and had some remarkable side effects: No CH attacks for a week.)

All about the different versions of Verapamil on rxlist.com (http://www.rxlist.com/cgi/generic/verapsr.htm)

Good luck,
Ueli

Title: Re: Please help. Verapamil question.
Post by kissmyglass on May 24^th, 2004, 7:46pm

Hey Steve...Ueli's post above? Thats really what I meant to say the first time... ;;D ;;D

Kev