[fritzthecat3@hotmai]

Hi i am suffering from cronic pain and am on ms contin 100mg and just started taling lyrica , am very doppey and uncorrinated and after reading all the side effects i am leary about taking any more. HELP

fritz

[anasazi23]

The worst thing you can do is read about the side-effects. Those lists are medico-legal monsters, and not good clinical information. Ask you Dr. what to expect. Lyrica has a dose-dependant drowsiness effect, but it usually will go away after awhile, much like with benzos. Lyrica can be a great medication if it works, but it is expensive. A cheaper alternative that is very nearly the same thing is neurontin.

[mrsD]

Is removed from the body 90% unchanged thru the urine. Since it is not appreciably metabolized into inactive forms, any DECREASE in kidney functions will allow it to build up in the body.

So if you have extreme sedation from a low beginning dose, you need to call your doctor and report it.

Morphine is a narcotic and the word narcotic means sleep inducing.
It is possible that combining your new drug with your morphine, has made this effect more likely. Lyrica is rather new, and not everything is understood about it yet. (yes drugs are put on the market, when not everything is known).

So you need to call your doctor, and see if there is a reason for your reactions.

Mechanism of Action

LYRICA (pregabalin) binds with high affinity to the alpha2-delta site (an auxiliary subunit of voltage-gated calcium channels) in central nervous system tissues. Although the mechanism of action of pregabalin is unknown, results with genetically modified mice and with compounds structurally related to pregabalin (such as gabapentin) suggest that binding to the alpha2-delta subunit may be involved in pregabalin's antinociceptive and antiseizure effects in animal models. In vitro, pregabalin reduces the calcium-dependent release of several neurotransmitters, possibly by modulation of calcium channel function...Pregabalin undergoes negligible metabolism in humans. Following a dose of radiolabeled pregabalin, approximately 90% of the administered dose was recovered in the urine as unchanged pregabalin. The N-methylated derivative of pregabalin, the major metabolite of pregabalin found in urine, accounted for 0.9% of the dose. In preclinical studies, pregabalin (S-enantiomer) did not undergo racemization to the R-enantiomer in mice, rats, rabbits, or monkeys.

Pregabalin is eliminated from the systemic circulation primarily by renal excretion as unchanged drug with a mean elimination half-life of 6.3 hours in subjects with normal renal function. Mean renal clearance was estimated to be 67.0 to 80.9 mL/min in young healthy subjects. Because pregabalin is not bound to plasma proteins this clearance rate indicates that renal tubular reabsorption is involved. Pregabalin elimination is nearly proportional to creatinine clearance (CLcr)

Understanding the metabolism of Lyrica is important, because many drugs may increase or decrease blood levels of other drugs taken at the same time.
The fact that Lyrica does not do this, means the morphine metabolism is not affected. However, your kidney status is IMPORTANT for Lyrica to be removed and doses don't then add up on each other unnecessarily.