Cynbalta

for depression

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I'm looking for contraindications on this drug. A friend of mine is on it and is using alcohol heavily with it. Im concerned the mixture could be extremely dangerous. How can I find info about the drug?

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There are two primary concerns with using alcohol with any kind of antidepressant, including this one.

First most antidepressants cause drowsiness and alcohol can, of course, intensify that, so you can see the issues that could arise from that if you are driving, working, and etc.

The second is the way that alcohol can affect the absorption of the drug, these drugs work on brain chemicals that have been shown to have an effect on your moods.

Cymbalta, which I have previously tried with no results, is an SSNRI, a Selective Seratonin and Norepinephrine Reuptake Inhibitor.

It is thought that some people who suffer depresson experience it becuase their bodies are not producing enough of these chemicals, Seratonin and Norepinephrine, so by using this drug that prevents them from being absorbed as fast into the brain and metabolized by the body as fast as they normally would, it will cause the little amoung that the person produces to stay in the brain longer and elevate their mood.

The problem you run into, when alcohol affects the absorption can actually go one of two ways, either it can speed the absorption of the drug, so the Cymbalta is metabolized out of the body faster than it should be, and thus your are negating its effects to help with depression.

The second would be slowing the rate at which your body metabolizes the drug, this can be extremely dangerous, as it can cause too much Seratonin to sit in the brain at once, this is called Seratonin Syndrome and it can be fatal.

For more information on the drug, here's the monograph listing:

Cymbalta Monograph Click Here

And here is the manufacturer's site about the drug:

Cymbalta Manufacturer's Site Click Here

You can also ask questions of a pharmacist, or if you are extremely concerned that this is regular and severely detrimental behavior, which it is, you can always make an anonymous call to their doctor to alert them to the situation. Very few people are honest with their doctors about how much alcohol they use, and a responsible doctor would not have prescribed this type of drug so readily if they knew their patient had a drinking problem, they would have first explored solutions for that, because the drinking alone could be causing depression and other problems, and no drug will help if that behavior continues.

Here's some other links talking about drinking while taking antidepressants:

http:/­/­depression.about.com/­cs/­drugsalcohol/­f/­alcoholmeds.htm

http:/­/­www.crescentlife.com/­psychfaq/­alcohol_and_antidepressants.htm

http:/­/­www.nhsdirect.nhs.uk/­articles/­article.aspx?articleId=863

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