Hey, is it safe to be on at least 12 pills every night?If you need to know the exact names if them, just let me know...
If they are all prescribed by your doctor, and all filled at the same pharmacy, then they think it's okay for you.
Yes and no.... Known drug interaction issues really only catch problems with "drug "A" interacts with drug "B"... Adverse interaction between drug "A" + "B" if taken with "C" and "H" are largely unknowns... Until there's a problem. Then it's usually not the drugs they look at first when trying to figure out why the person is laying on the floor. (Went through this several times with the ex-wife.)
That did happen to hubby, too. He hit the floor several times with something that looked like seizures. They did CT Scans, etc. Finally, the figured out that they needed to decrease the dosage on one of medications. *Prang! Magic! No more falling on the floor.
I find it truly alarming that doctors allowed this to happen in the first place. All drugs have side effects which to some extent weaken the body. Simply adding more drugs to overcome side effects without reducing drug 'A' is a sure route to serious problems. It sounds to me as if the likely cause of your husbands seizure problem was hyper or hypoglycemic related, possibly caused by the affect of the drug cocktail on his Adrenalin levels. With the access to data in 2018, things like this should simply never happen. I wonder if his doctor informed the health authorities and drug companies about what happened. If so, warnings should have been sent all over the world of the dangers of the combination that caused the problem. Sadly, it is all to often only when someone dies that people really take notice. If your husband still has multiple health issues, I would suggest that you attempt to get his medications overseen by a senior consultant.
He only takes medications for pain. He takes Neurontin, Tramadol, Hydrocodone, and Zanaflex. They reduced the Tramadol and that took care of the problem.
Their are countless papers warning of the dangers of Tramadol in combination with other drugs and all of them suggest at least halving the dose. It works on calming the brain receptors, but can also cause inflammation that CAUSES pain. Even the smallest amount of alcohol reacts violently with the drug. I would suggest trying to find a consultant who can address the inflammation causing the pain, rather than possibly increasing it in an attempt to subdue the discomfort. Clearly I don't know the full situation. If for example his main pain is following major surgery, the approach is totally different from arthritic or rheumatic inflammation pain relief.
He has severe Diabetic Neuropathy. The diabetes is under control with no medication because he lost about 100 lbs. but he was left with the neuropathy.
Loosing all that weight alone is bound to have led to some pain as his body adjusts, but was well worth the effort in the long term. From your first comment, I suspected diabetic issues and although under control they will take a time to adjust to his new body mass. Possibly it was a failure to match drug doses to his decreasing body mass that increased concentrations and triggered the recent problem. However the fact that the cure involved a reduced (rather than increased) use of drugs is good news in itself. Just a thought. Now that the Tramadol has been reduced, I wonder if it would be possible to reduce the other drugs that were helping to offset the inflammation. What ever you do, don't make any changes without discussing them with his doctor, but at the same time, never be afraid to make your concerns known and if necessary ask to fully discuss his long term treatment plans with a consultant neurologist. PS, although I studied medicine for 3 years in my younger days, I went into theater design and chartered as an engineer, so I am not a qualified doctor. However, during the recession when theaters had no money to spend on rebuilding and refurbishment, I went back to work for 5 years on new ground breaking cardiothoracic surgery. I hope that I did not mislead you into thinking that I am a fully qualified GP. Regards, Wills.
