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How does morphine compare with tegratol?
Tegratol is a seizure medication also used for bipolar disorder. Morphine is an opiate pain killer. They have absolutely nothing in common.
Can tegratol cause mental disturbances?
The most common side effects of Tegretol or carbamazepine are GI-related (stomach upset, nausea or vomiting, dry mouth). However, you might be one of the rare people who do have the more severe side effects. These include confusion, mood changes, hallucinations, and sudden suicidal thoughts or actions. If you feel that you are experiencing these symptoms, call your doctor at once and ask if it is safe for you to stop taking this medication - don't stop suddenly if you take it for seizures, as stopping could cause a seizure.
What can you take besides Depacote and Lithium if Lamectal caused you to have a big seizure once you got up to 100 mg and you are now on nothing but your ADD meds?
I am not a doctor! Always consult your own physician and psychiatrist before modifying any medications that you take. Further, I have no idea about the possible interactions and side-effects of the ADD medication that you are taking. Please keep this in mind. Are you taking Depacote / Lithium / Lamictal to treat bipolar disorder? If so, you should definitely look at http://www.bipolarworld.net/. It is a great resource for possible treatments for bipolar and bipolar combinations. I have a friend who suffers from bipolar, and together, we have been trying to come up with a combination of meds that will control the symptoms with the least number of side-effects. Why did you stop taking / not try Depacote and Lithium? Weight gain is a common side-effect for both. If that is a reason, then you may want to look into treating the weight-gain with Glucophage. It's a drug for diabetes, but new studies show that it can effectively control weight-gain with Depacote. Also, the weight-gain with depacote can also be reduced in some patients when put on a slow release formula. A "half" alternative to Depacote is Depakene. Although they technically are the same mood-stabilizer, they are delivered differently, and many people report vastly different side-effects when taking one or the other. Unfortunately, they are often refered to as the same drug, and your physician or psych (or even the pharmacy) may switch you back and forth, causing all sorts of problems. They really should be treated as separate drugs. But whatever problems you had with Depacote may not show up with Depakene. I probably would not want to mess around with seizures, but at what rate were you increasing the lamictal? With lamictal, most side-effects will go away on their own with patience and a low dose increase. The current recommendation is to start at 12.5mg and increase by 12.5mg each week. If a side-effect occurs, go back down to the previous dose and wait for the side-effect to disappear. Then go up slowly. If you have problems with lamictal, you can cut the increase by half again. Start at about 6mg and go up in steps of 6mg. I don't know how well this works for seizures, but it works for most other side effects of lamictal, including the rash. (Of course, if you get a rash, see a physician immediately). But from what I understand, Lamictal is a great drug for treating mood disorders, but because of the death rash, most psychs will take you off of it at the first signs of a problem, when lowering the dose and waiting can often clear up the problem. Having said that, there are two more drugs that you can use for mood stabilization. Trileptal is the first. It is better for treating bipolar manic states rather than depressed states. The occurance of side-effects is quite low, but it packs less of a punch. Normally, you have to combine a more powerful mood-stabilizer with Trileptal for it to be effective. But on the positive side, the more powerful mood-stabilizer can usually be given at a lower dose, thus decreasing its side-effects. The second is tegratol. Tegratol is a more powerful version of Trileptal, but with the power comes more side-effects. I haven't done much research into Tegratol, but it is another drug that you should consider. Oh, one other mood-disorder treatment that you may consider is thyroid hormone treatments. If you have not have your thyroid checked, you should, as an under-active or over-active thyroid can cause mood-disorders. But even if your thyroid checks out normal and your thyroid hormone levels are normal, some experiements are being done supplementing these hormones to control mood. This is a much less researched path, but initial results are promising. IF YOU are looking for other seizure meds; you may want to ask you doctor about the following: Dilantin; Klonopin; Valium; Phenobarbital; Neurontin. Good Luck
