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the amazing thing is people look at us after we are all drugged up -

and we feel fine sometimes we look fine - maybe?

but we are not fine... no?
how can we be -we are on drugs?
drugs are palliative at best
but many have overdosed
on prescription drugs and accidental death

Drug Overdose Deaths Double in Five Years
From Buddy T,

About.com Health's Disease and Condition
content is reviewed by our Medical Review Board

Second Leading Cause of Accidental Death
Unintentional fatal drug overdoses nearly doubled from 1999 to 2004 and were the second leading cause of accidental death in the United States in 2004, behind only automobile crashes, according to the Centers for Disease Control.
Deaths from accidental overdoses increased to 19,838 in 2004, from 11,155 in 1999, according to the CDC report, which was based on death certificate information (which does not detail which drugs were used). However, researchers believe the increasing misuse of prescription drugs by those ages 15 to 24 accounts for the majority of the statistic.


Illegal Drugs Not to Blame
Officially, drug overdose deaths are listed on death certificates as "poisoning." However, data from the National Vital Statistics System shows that drug poisoning accounted for 94.7 percent of all unintentional poisoning deaths by 2004.
The CDC attributes the 62.5 percent rise in drug overdose deaths between 1999 and 2004 to a higher use of prescription painkillers and increasing numbers of overdoses of cocaine and prescription sedatives. The increase cannot be attributed to heroin, methamphetamines or other illegal drugs, the report said.


Groups With Highest Increases
According to the CDC report, these groups had the highest increases in deaths by drug overdose between 1999 and 2004:

Females - 103.0 percent

Whites - 75.8 percent

Persons in the southern United States - 113.6 percent

Persons aged 15-24 years - 113.3 percent

It's Not the Inner Cities
Although drug overdose deaths are historically associated with urban areas, the latest figures from the CDC show the greatest increases in rural areas between 1999 and 2004. This finding coincides with other research that shows prescription drug abuse, especially of painkillers, is increasing more rapidly in rural areas.
Rates increased during the five-year period by less than one-third in the Northeast and West but more than doubled in the South and nearly doubled in the Midwest. Rates doubled in 23 states, with West Virginia showing the greatest increase with 550 percent.

In other words, the dramatic increase in drug overdose deaths is not driven by illegal drug use in the inner cities; it is being fueled by prescription drug abuse in white, middle-class, rural America.


Other Groups Affected
The group with the highest increase in fatal drug overdoses were white non-Hispanic females, with an increase of 136.5 percent. The rate of increase for females was twice that of males.
Among females, rates among whites more than doubled by 2004, but nonwhites showed smaller increases or even decreased. Overall, rates increased 75.8 percent among whites, 55.8 percent among American Indians/Alaska Natives, 27.4 percent among Asians/Pacific Islanders and 11.2 percent among blacks.


Suggestions for Solutions
To combat the rising hike in accidental drug overdose, the CDC recommends tightening regulatory measures, improving physician awareness, supporting treatment for drug dependence and possibly modifying the drugs themselves to reduce their potential for abuse.
The CDC also recommends that state agencies that manage prescription-monitoring programs try to identify patients who are getting multiple prescriptions from different doctors and identify physicians who write prescriptions beyond what is appropriate.

Sources
Centers for Disease Control. Mobidity and Mortality Weekly Report. February 9, 2007 / 56(05);93-96.
Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration Office of Applied Studies. Results from the 2005 National Survey on Drug Use and Health: national findings. 2006.


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I had to look up the word palliative: "Relieving or soothing the symptoms of a disease or disorder without effecting a cure." That describes it well.

I think there is a tendency for doctors to give us "feel-good" medication. I'll bet it works for many folks in the population as a whole. Every doctor I see wants to give me antidepressants, in spite of me telling them that I don't feel depressed and that I don't even like antidepressants.

But you know, I'll bet a lot of people recover from various problems naturally and antidepressants just help get them over the rough spots. Once "healed" the drugs should be stopped. But are they?

When I was first prescribed antidepressants about eleven years ago, they helped. I felt good. I kept taking them and the doctors kept prescribing newer and more powerful varieties. Now, they all give me problems: headaches, insomnia, tension, anxiety, etc. I'd swear I've become allergic to antidepressants.

In spite of my protests, just last week, a doctor wrote me yet another prescription for antidepressants.

I get real frustrated about this.

Karl

Sinemet -(levadopa carbidopa) is a replacement therapy
for the chemicals that your brain no longer produces or processes properly.

i was diagnosed with pd at 26, 17 years later, i've a lot of different perspectives.

there is a point in time which you must learn to listen to your body's needs and not just your own wants. there is a fine line between wanting a certain level of function and the level of function that a combination of meds will accomplish.

i speak from the experience, i was medically retired. i was consuming the max allowed doses of sinemet, mirapex, and comtan, neighborhood of 500+ pills a month. in order to work full-time, take care of my mother who was paralysed on her right side from a stroke, get home do supper, kids, ect.

i take far fewer meds now, my activities are somewhat limited, but i've learned to listen to my body's needs rather than the demands i had placed upon it trying to continue to perform a rather high level of function.

yes, we are addicted to sinemet in more ways than one. however, it's up to you to choose your path wisely, as the commitment to these drugs are lifelong at the present time.

hope this helps a bit.

Hey Toadie! so good to see your name!

I agree with you - if you are in the position to keep working or be physically active the dosing is different than if you do not have a demanding schedule to keep.

My symptoms were brought under control after I retired and began a medication regimen that was more minimalist. Retirement also brought less stress, which had a positive benefit.

I also decided years ago that I would put up with some tremor rather than be over medicated and suffer the resulting negative side effects.

I'm a newbie at PD. I'm 56 and newly diagnosed, yet I can trace the symptoms back more than fifteen years. I'm not at retirement age yet and am trying to return to work. So far sinemet really helps but I'm having some real problems with sleeping and/or the meds they give me to "help" me sleep. I need to keep working to support my family, yet I yearn to just listen to my body and do what it says. Having to work is a stressor, and having to take meds to work is even more of a stressor. The role stress plays in this disease is very evident to me. It's like a tug-of-war between my body telling me it's time to start listening and retire and my social environment telling me that I must keep going.

Also 56, I have come to the conclusion that the time has come to try for disability. I have hung on only because I was self-employed and didn't have to punch a clock. But I also have had to admit that what I was doing (real estate development) was investment and not work. With the tanking of the US market I have to admit that I am disabled for a "real" job and hope the SS sees it that way.

We would all cost society less if the stress factor was readily accepted as a cause for the transition.

Antidepressants only work for a finite period. Then it is necessary to change to a different one. Karl, you usually slide slowly back into depression. It is an insideous process. As mentioned earlier, antidepressants do not cure depression, they merely "level the playing field" so one can function.
Get a "MMPI" test to get an accurate guage of your depression.

Charlie

We often say that if we knew the cause of PD we might then know the cure. If we are born without PD and only a small percentage of us are at most genetically "more disposed" to developing PD, then we must be infected with or damaged by something in our environment after birth.

Of the many possibilities, we have identified lots of toxins that damage and stress our bodies or at least the bodies of test animals in a way that leads to a first diagnosis of PD. Some toxins are limited to a single exposure. Our exposure to many known toxins is chronic and ongoing. (e.g. the toxins created by emotional stress) So in fact we do know the cause or at least a large part of the cause of PD in many cases.

If we have suffered irreversible damage then the cure would be to replace the damaged part. Given the endless variations of our symptoms and the seemingly progressive nature of PD, it appears that the damage is progressive and ongoing such that we often look back many years for the onset. If the damage is progressive and ongoing and the exposure to toxins is progressive and ongoing the cure would be.... duh?

I’m not trying to be simplistic or a smart-donkey. I was warned by a doctor I have unending respect for in 1980 about drugs when he prescribed antidepressants for me. He said: “There is reason to believe that the human brain will heal itself and find a chemical balance within two years without the use of drugs. If you take an antidepressant, you should plan on taking it for the rest of your life. If you stop it is extremely likely that you will experience depression again and need to take antidepressants again. Every time you have depression it becomes harder to treat. Knowing this I recommend you start antidepressant therapy. Severe chronic refractory depression is a fatal disease.”

In the year 2000, twenty years later, I reported difficulty walking and a slight tremor in my right hand. He said he suspected PD and referred me to a neurologist. I knew nothing of PD. We talked about brain chemistry and brutal truth about using drugs for symptomatic relief while enduring endless side effects in a loosing battle. Was PD a “side effect” of twenty years of drug therapy? What about the brain being able to heal itself? Why did he prescribe drugs? What were the alternatives.

The bottom line was simple. You can just pop a pill or you can turn your life upside down with a religious determination to detoxify your body and soul and pray to be healed. A modern doctor is taught to prescribe drugs. A modern patient is taught to take drugs. Neither doctor or patient is taught about true healing. The decision is a hard one and still lingers. It’s now 27 years and despite freezing offs just this side of death and the terror of dyskinetic fits I still find it easier to pop a pill for “relief of symptoms”. Am I addicted to sinemet? Duh?

Arvid Carlsson

Arvid Carlsson made the seminal discovery in the late 1950's that dopamine is a transmitter in the mammalian brain. Dopamine was found to be located in other regions of the brain than noradrenaline, especially in the basal ganglia, which are involved in the control of movements.
He then made a series of experiments that became the scientific basis for the successful therapy against Parkinson's disease. By giving the drug reserpine to animals he emptied the stores of dopamine in their brains.

This produced the symptoms of Parkinson's disease, especially lack of movements (akinesia) and stiffness in the muscles (rigidity).

9 October 2000
The Nobel Assembly at Karolinska Institute has today decided to award
The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for 2000
jointly to
Arvid Carlsson, Paul Greengard and Eric Kandel
for their discoveries concerning "signal transduction in the nervous system"

Summary
In the human brain there are more than hundred billion nerve cells. They are connected to each other through an infinitely complex network of nerve processes. The message from one nerve cell to another is transmitted through different chemical transmitters. The signal transduction takes place in special points of contact, called synapses. A nerve cell can have thousands of such contacts with other nerve cells.
The three Nobel Laureates in Physiology or Medicine have made pioneering discoveries concerning one type of signal transduction between nerve cells, referred to as slow synaptic transmission. These discoveries have been crucial for an understanding of the normal function of the brain and how disturbances in this signal transduction can give rise to neurological and psychiatric diseases.

These findings have resulted in the development of new drugs.

Arvid Carlsson, Department of Pharmacology,
Göteborg University is rewarded for his discovery that dopamine is a transmitter in the brain and that it has great importance for our ability to control movements. His research has led to the realization that Parkinson's disease is caused by a lack of dopamine in certain parts of the brain and that an efficient remedy (L-dopa) for this disease could be developed.

Arvid Carlsson has made a number of subsequent discoveries, which have further clarified the role of dopamine in the brain. He has thus demonstrated the mode of action of drugs used for the treatment of schizophrenia.
Paul Greengard, Laboratory of Molecular and Cellular Science,
Rockefeller University, New York, is rewarded for his discovery of how dopamine and a number of other transmitters exert their action in the nervous system. The transmitter first acts on a receptor on the cell surface. This will trigger a cascade of reactions that will affect certain "key proteins" that in turn regulate a variety of functions in the nerve cell. The proteins become modified as phosphate groups are added (phosphorylation) or removed (dephosphorylation), which causes a change in the shape and function of the protein. Through this mechanism the transmitters can carry their message from one nerve cell to another.
Eric Kandel, Center for Neurobiology and Behavior, Columbia University, New York, is rewarded for his discoveries of how the efficiency of synapses can be modified, and which molecular mechanisms that take part.

With the nervous system of a sea slug as experimental model he has demonstrated how changes of synaptic function are central for learning and memory. Protein phosphorylation in synapses plays an important role for the generation of a form of short term memory. For the development of a long term memory a change in protein synthesis is also required, which can lead to alterations in shape and function of the synapse.

Arvid Carlsson
Dopamine - an important transmitter
Arvid Carlsson performed a series of pioneering studies during the late 1950's, which showed that dopamine is an important transmitter in the brain. It was previously believed that dopamine was only a precursor of another transmitter, noradrenaline. Arvid Carlsson developed an essay that made it possible to measure tissue levels of dopamine with high sensitivity.

He found that dopamine was concentrated in other areas of the brain than noradrenaline, which led him to the conclusion that dopamine is a transmitter in itself. Dopamine existed in particularly high concentrations in those parts of the brain, called the basal ganglia, which are of particular importance for the control of motor behavior.

In a series of experiments Arvid Carlsson used a naturally occurring substance, reserpine, which depletes the storage of several synaptic transmitters. When it was given to experimental animals they lost their ability to perform spontaneous movements. He then treated the animals with L-dopa, a precursor of dopamine, which is transformed to dopamine in the brain. The symptoms disappeared and the animals resumed their normal motor behavior. In contrast, animals that received a precursor of the transmitter serotonin did not improve the motor behavior.

Arvid Carlsson also showed that the treatment with L-dopa normalized the levels of dopamine in the brain.

Drugs against Parkinson's disease
Arvid Carlsson realized that the symptoms caused by reserpine were similar to the syndrome of Parkinson's disease.

This led, in turn, to the finding that Parkinson patients have abnormally low concentrations of dopamine in the basal ganglia. As a consequence L-dopa was developed as a drug against Parkinson's disease and today still is the most important treatment for the disease.
During Parkinson's disease dopamine producing nerve cells in the basal ganglia degenerate, which causes tremor, rigidity and akinesia. L-dopa, which is converted to dopamine in the brain, compensates for the lack of dopamine and normalizes motor behavior.
Antipsychotic and antidepressive drugs
Apart from the successful treatment of Parkinson's disease Arvid Carlsson's research has increased our understanding of the mechanism of several other drugs. He showed that antipsychotic drugs, mostly used against schizophrenia, affect synaptic transmission by blocking dopamine receptors. The discoveries of Arvid Carlsson have had great importance for the treatment of depression, which is one of our most common diseases. He has contributed strongly to the development of selective serotonin uptake blockers, a new generation of antidepressive drugs.

http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/m...000/press.html

Why is this medication prescribed?

http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/d...r/a601107.html

Reserpine is used to treat high blood pressure. It works by decreasing your heart rate and relaxing the blood vessels so that blood can flow more easily through the body. It also is used to treat severe agitation in patients with mental disorders.

This medication is sometimes prescribed for other uses; ask your doctor or pharmacist for more information.

How should this medicine be used? Return to top
Reserpine comes as a tablet to take by mouth. It usually is taken once daily. Follow the directions on your prescription label carefully, and ask your doctor or pharmacist to explain any part you do not understand. Take reserpine exactly as directed. Do not take more or less of it or take it more often than prescribed by your doctor.

Reserpine controls high blood pressure or symptoms of agitation, but does not cure them. Continue to take reserpine even if you feel well. Do not stop taking reserpine without talking to your doctor. Abruptly stopping reserpine may increase blood pressure and cause unwanted side effects.

What special precautions should I follow? Return to top
Before taking reserpine,

tell your doctor and pharmacist if you are allergic to reserpine, aspirin, tartrazine (a yellow dye in some processed foods and medications), or any other drugs.
tell your doctor and pharmacist what prescription and nonprescription medications you are taking, especially amitriptyline (Elavil), clomipramine (Anafranil), desipramine (Norpramin), digoxin (Lanoxin), doxepin (Adepin, Sinequan), ephedrine, epinephrine, imipramine (Tofranil), MAO inhibitors [phenelzine (Nardil) and tranylcypromine (Parnate)], methylphenidate (Ritalin), nortriptyline (Aventyl, Pamelor), phenylephrine, protriptyline (Vivactil), quinidine (Quinaglute), trimipramine (Surmontil), and vitamins.
tell your doctor if you have or have ever had kidney disease, gallstones, ulcers, ulcerative colitis, a history of depression, or electric shock therapy.
tell your doctor if you are pregnant, plan to become pregnant, or are breast-feeding. If you become pregnant while taking reserpine, call your doctor.
if you are having surgery, including dental surgery, tell the doctor or dentist that you are taking reserpine.
you should know that this drug may make you drowsy or dizzy. Do not drive a car or operate machinery until you know how it affects you.
ask your doctor about the safe use of alcohol while you are taking reserpine. Alcohol can make the side effects from reserpine worse.
What special dietary instructions should I follow? Return to top
Your doctor may prescribe a low-salt or low-sodium diet. Follow these directions carefully.

What should I do if I forget a dose? Return to top
Do not take the missed dose when you remember it; skip the missed dose and continue your regular dosing schedule. Do not take a double dose to make up for a missed one.

What side effects can this medication cause? Return to top
Reserpine may cause side effects. Tell your doctor if any of these symptoms are severe or do not go away:

dizziness
loss of appetite
diarrhea
upset stomach
vomiting
stuffy nose
headache
dry mouth
decreased sexual ability

If you experience any of the following symptoms, call your doctor immediately:

depression
nightmares
fainting
slow heartbeat
chest pain
swollen ankles or feet

If you experience a serious side effect, you or your doctor may send a report to the Food and Drug Administration's (FDA) MedWatch Adverse Event Reporting program online [at http://www.fda.gov/MedWatch/report.htm] or by phone [1-800-332-1088].

What storage conditions are needed for this medicine? Return to top
Keep this medication in the container it came in, tightly closed, and out of reach of children. Store at room temperature and away from excess heat and moisture (not in the bathroom). Throw away any medication that is outdated or no longer needed. Talk to your pharmacist about the proper disposal of your medication.

In case of emergency/overdose Return to top
In case of overdose, call your local poison control center at 1-800-222-1222. If the victim has collapsed or is not breathing, call local emergency services at 911.

What other information should I know? Return to top
Keep all appointments with your doctor and the laboratory. Your blood pressure should be checked regularly to determine your response to reserpine.

Your doctor may ask you to check your pulse (heart rate) daily and will tell you how rapid it should be. Ask your doctor or pharmacist to teach you how to take your pulse. If your pulse is slower than it should be, call your doctor before taking reserpine that day.

Weigh yourself every day. Call your doctor if you experience rapid weight gain.

Do not let anyone else take your medication. Ask your pharmacist any questions you have about refilling your prescription.

Brand names Return to top
Serpalan®
Serpasil®