billhanna...
Methamphetamine is a street drug which *causes* depression, and
many other unpleasant symptoms, during withdrawal, which tends
to eventually occur more and more quickly, and so is inevitable.
I therefore assume you're referring to amphetamines, in general,
some of which exist in the form of legally prescribed medications.
"METHYLPHENIDATE (Ritalin®) is a drug used in the treatment of
depression, narcolepsy, and childhood hyperkinesis."
http://ag.ca.gov/bfs/toxlab/summ.htm
Dextroamphetamine sulfate, commonly called dextroamphetamine
or Dexedrine, is another stimulant medication even more rarely
used in the treatment of depression, due to the risk of addiction.
http://www.healthoptions.com/dexedrine.html
Both of these drugs may be used to counteract the effects of
opiod medications used in conjunction with controlling the
pain of dying patients.
Table 4, in this extensive page from the American Academy of
Family Physicians website, which discusses the management
of pain in the dying patient, lists the numerous opiod drugs,
such as morphine and codeine, which are sometimes used to
manage pain:
http://www.aafp.org/afp/20000201/755.html
Further down, in Table 5, you can see that Dexedrine and
Ritalin are used to manage the side effect of sedation, or
drowsiness, which is likely to occur with the use of opiods:
"Dextroamphetamine (Dexedrine), in a dosage of 2.5 to 5 mg
twice daily, or methylphenidate (Ritalin), in a dosage of
2.5 to 5 mg twice daily"
http://www.aafp.org/afp/20000201/755.html
Given that this extensive webpage amounts to 24 pages on the
topic of pain management in the dying patient, I doubt there's
anything that can be added to it.
Among the 24 scholarly references cited at the end of the
page is:
Bruera E, Brenneis C, Paterson A, MacDonald R. Use of
methylphenidate [Ritalin] as an adjunct to narcotic
analgesics in patients with advanced cancer. J Pain
Symptom Manage 1989;4:3-6.
Please do not rate this answer until you are satisfied that
the answer cannot be improved upon by way of a dialog
established through the "Request for Clarification" process.
sublime1-ga
Additional information may be found from an exploration of
the links resulting from the Google searches outlined below.
Searches done, via Google:
methamphetamine "treatment of depression"
://www.google.com/search?q=methamphetamine+%22treatment+of+depression%22
dextroamphetamine OR Dexedrine depression
://www.google.com/search?q=dextroamphetamine+OR+Dexedrine+depression
METHYLPHENIDATE OR Ritalin dying pain
://www.google.com/search?q=METHYLPHENIDATE+OR+Ritalin+dying+pain |
Request for Answer Clarification by
billhanna-ga
on
08 Mar 2006 11:09 PST
Methamphetamine is also a sccheduled drug sold as Desoxyn. Even a
simple search will yeald results indicating it's use in treating
depression particularly in patients who may be dying and on lots of
other mnedications to deal with other illness. Thus your answer is no
answer at all.
BTW..... The difficulty in fonding the references I seek is not
because they do not exist but it is due to the plethora of anti-drug
hits
Also..Dexadrine is commonly used to treat depression.
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Clarification of Answer by
sublime1-ga
on
08 Mar 2006 11:34 PST
bill...
You said:
"Methamphetamine is also a sccheduled drug sold as Desoxyn. Even a
simple search will yeald results indicating it's use in treating
depression particularly in patients who may be dying and on lots of
other mnedications to deal with other illness."
It's helpful if you include, in your question, any information you
already have, so that a researcher doesn't duplicate it. If a simple
search yields the type of results you seem to be requesting in your
question, I don't understand what you're asking for. If you can
clarify this, I'll be happy to redouble my efforts.
sublime1-ga
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Request for Answer Clarification by
billhanna-ga
on
08 Mar 2006 11:39 PST
Also.... I ask this because I am new to google answers. I assume that
my question now shows up as answered and will draw no more answers
(correct ones). Thus if you decide to do no further work I will be
left with an incorrect answer.
Does that mean that my only recorse is to give you a low rating and
just count my money to be ripped off?
I mean..... All anyone need do is to correctly read my question to see
that your answer does not apply to it.
Even a PDR indicates tnat Desoxyn is sometimes used in llegit medicine
for a number of things and hints at it's ues in heavly medicated
patients. This is primarly doe to the fact that they are dealing with
loads of side-effects (from other meds) and Methadrine (Desoxyn) has
fewer than the rest of the amphetamine compounds.
Please take the time to properly answer my question. If not then
please re-submit it as unanswered.
Regards,
Bill
billhanna@boggletech.com
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Request for Answer Clarification by
billhanna-ga
on
08 Mar 2006 11:45 PST
Yes.... The problem is findingg a way through the clutter of
antti-drug infformation. Doctors and researchers ussing methampetamie
for positive uses tend to keep their head doown and get lost in the
anti drug propangda.
I am sorry for not including more info in my query. This is my first question
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Request for Answer Clarification by
billhanna-ga
on
08 Mar 2006 11:53 PST
http://www.dexedrine.net/ Towards the end of excerpt you will find a
passing reference to desoxyn
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Request for Answer Clarification by
billhanna-ga
on
08 Mar 2006 12:09 PST
You said, "If a simple
search yields the type of results you seem to be requesting in your
question, I don't understand what you're asking for. If you can
clarify this, I'll be happy to redouble my efforts."
I am asking for decent references that are worthy of submission to a
board of doctors. I already have the Desoxyb in my treatament regime,
but thus far my co-pay is far higher than it would be if the board
approves.
BTW.... It works very well for the intended use. The problems come
when people do not control their use properly and use street drugs.
Thus far I am not even addicted to it. Howeveer, addiction if far from
the worse concern in my life :)
Thanks again
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Clarification of Answer by
sublime1-ga
on
08 Mar 2006 13:54 PST
bill...
Considering that researchers earn 75% of the price of a question,
I'm pretty close to being ready to give up, but here's what I
found, for what it's worth. If it isn't satisfactory, let me know
and I'll ask the editors to remove my answer.
On the site of the National Institute on Drug Abuse is a PDF
document which pretty well speaks to your situation, titled
'Impact of Prescription Drug Diversion Control Systems on Medical
Practice and Patient Care', which states, in the Introduction:
"This review of the medical uses of Schedule II stimulant drugs
has been prepared for a meeting to evaluate the impact of
prescription drug diversion control systems on medical practice
and patient care. The stimulant drugs used in conditions other
than appetite control?chiefly dextroamphetamine (Dexedrine),
methamphetamine (Desoxyn) and methylphenidate (Ritalin)?fall
under a major diversion control system based on the Controlled
Substances Act of 1970. This act placed these drugs in Schedule
II, made refillable prescriptions illegal, and placed controls
and quotas on their manufacture. This has already had a massive
effect on the extent of use of these drugs in medicine. One
source (Grinspoon and Hedblom 1975) claims that over ten billion
tablets of amphetamine-like drugs were made in the United States
in 1970. Although no relevant figures or current production or
sales of stimulant drugs are available, at least a 90 percent
decrease in availability for prescription purposes in the United
States seems likely. This massive reduction in use has been
accompanied by great reluctance on the part of most physicians
to prescribe stimulants, even when the medical indication is
very clear or when the patient?s clinical history clearly
documents complete failure to respond to any other noncontrolled
medication."
It goes on to speak of the value of Desoxyn in cases where Ritalin
is not well-tolerated. Unfortunately it refers to narcolepsy as the
condition under discussion. Still, it addresses the core of your
dilemma:
"While methylphenidate is often the drug of choice for the
treatment of narcolepsy, some patients are nonresponsive
to that drug. Methamphetamine (Desoxyn) is an alternative
stimulant drug for effective treatment of nonresponders to
methylphenidate. The use of methamphetamine for narcolepsy
was first described by Eaton (1943). The efficacy of
methamphetamine for narcolepsy, and its reduced side effects
as compared to dextroamphetamine, was again described in great
detail by Yoss and Daly (1968, 1974). Yet, methamphetamine
is rarely mentioned in the recent literature or in text or
reference books about narcolepsy."
I believe it is for this same reason that, while Ritalin and
Dexedrine are mentioned prominently in the extensive article
I provided you previously from the American Academy of Family
Physicians website, which discusses the management of pain in
the dying patient, desoxyn and/or methedrine are not.
As noted previously, Table 5 makes it clear that Dexedrine
and Ritalin are used to manage the side effect of sedation,
or drowsiness, which is likely to occur with the use of
opiods:
"Dextroamphetamine (Dexedrine), in a dosage of 2.5 to 5 mg
twice daily, or methylphenidate (Ritalin), in a dosage of
2.5 to 5 mg twice daily"
http://www.aafp.org/afp/20000201/755.html
This makes it clear enough that stimulants have their place
in conjunction with pain management medication regimens, and
would seem to me to satisfy the point you are trying to make
to the review board. If they are not initially satisfied with
that citation, I would point them to the 330+ page government
report I cited above, which makes it clear that current trends
toward avoiding the prescription of certain drugs are cautious
to the point of being counterproductive.
The problem in finding specific documentation for the use
of Desoxyn or Methedrine is clarified by the study above.
While Dexedrine and Ritalin are approved as acceptable,
though with considerable precautions as to their potentially
addictive nature, Methamphetamine has received such negative
press as to have been more or less blacklisted - so much so
that a search for Desoxyn or Methedrine on the American
Academy of Family Physicians, from which came the article on
the use of stimulants in pain management scenarios for the
dying, returns only one result regarding Desoxyn, as one of
the possible drugs for use in treating ADHD:
desoxyn OR methedrine site:www.aafp.org
://www.google.com/search?q=desoxyn+OR+methedrine+site%3Awww.aafp.org
I believe it's for this reason that references to its use
are so difficult to locate, aside from them being buried
among results about street drugs, and I'd bet that any
direct references that could be located would also be found
to be "outdated" from the current perspective, due to
current attitudes, if not by the actual date on the citation.
That's the best I can do with what's out there. If it's not
enough, just let me know.
sublime1-ga
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Clarification of Answer by
sublime1-ga
on
08 Mar 2006 14:02 PST
Oh - here's the refined search I used to find what I did:
desoxyn OR methedrine dying OR "terminally ill" "pain management"
://www.google.com/search?q=desoxyn+OR+methedrine+dying+OR+%22terminally+ill%22+%22pain+management%22
This returned only 287 results, which I scoured pretty thoroughly.
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