Thanks, SueV
I was not looking for a ticket to do whatever I wanted as long as I had enough Mestinon. Just trying to understand how it works. My hubby had Addison's disease and was on hydrocortisone and florinef, which had to be adjusted according to his activity level, stress, emotions, illness, dental work, etc. Any stress had to be taken into consideration, which was really hard to get across to medical caregivers, of all people.
What I want to do is forego non critical activities and conserve energy for critical ones and just needed to know if this was how mestinon operates in the body.
Ironically, except for the localized weakness, his diseased behaved a lot like MG does. Too little or too much meds both being a bad thing.
Quote:
Originally Posted by suev
Hi Linda,
Mestinon (pill) takes about 20 - 30 min to 'kick in'. On average, it lasts for 4 hours. For me, I get peak effectiveness in the 1 - 2 1/2 hour window.
You are right about the effectiveness being different depending on what you are doing. It's not necessarily that you 'use it up' - but rather your activity level, stress, heat, hormone levels, what you have eaten, other drugs you taken, etc. are taxing you more than on a day when you're sitting around the house in the air conditioning watching a movie drinking a cold ice tea!!
What you don't want to do is take more Mestinon looking for it to take away the heavy, tired muscle feeling...since too much can get you in a bad place too. There may come a time when you and your neuro will adjust your dosage based on experience and activity considerations. Right now, think of this as setting your baseline.
Re: food & drugs. There are lots of things that can influence MG (not Mestinon). Example: some antibiotics are contraindicated, caffine helps, alcohol can make us weaker, etc.
Hope this helps. Search some of the older posts for Drugs and Food threads. There has been much discussion about both in just that last few months.
|