Medication for anxiety how to#

What if I cannot take even the smallest pill size of the medication?

Patients with heart problems should use special caution if taking Anafranil.

Very elderly patients should avoid Anafranil as the first drug tried, since it has side effects that can interfere with thinking and can cause or worsen confusion.

Click here to read more about the benefits and risks of using SRIs during pregancy and/or while breastfeeding. Some OCD patients choose to use exposure and response prevention (ERP) to minimize medication use during the first or last trimester of pregnancy. Many pregnant women have taken them without difficulty. If severe OCD cannot be controlled any other way, research has indicated that these medications seem to be safe.

Women who are pregnant or are breastfeeding should weigh the decision to take these drugs with their doctor.

Sometimes an adjustment in dose or a switch in the time of day it is taken is all that is needed.

It is important for the patient to be open about problems that may be caused by the medication.

The patient and doctor must weigh the benefits of the drug against the side effects.

Most patients will experience one or more side effects from all of the medications listed above. Adding these medications to your body can help boost your serotonin and get your brain back on track. If your brain does not have enough serotonin, then your the nerves in your brain might not be communicating right. Serotonin is used by the brain as a messenger.

We do know that each of these medications affect a chemical in the brain called serotonin.

Medication for anxiety how to#

The good news is that after decades of research, we know how to treat patients, even though we do not know exactly why our treatments work. It remains unclear as to how these particular drugs help OCD. Drugs work very differently for each person. Remember! It is important not to give up after failing one or two drugs.

The only way to tell which drug will be the most helpful with the least side effects is to try each drug for about 3 months. However, for any given patient, one drug may be very effective, and the others may not. Whenever any of the above drugs have been studied head to head, there seems to be no significant difference in how well they work. venlafaxine (Effexor®) – up to 375 mg/day.escitalopram (Lexapro®) – up to 40 mg/day.clomipramine (Anafranil®) – up to 250 mg/day.citalopram (Celexa®) – up to 40 mg/day*.sertraline (Zoloft®) – up to 200 mg/day.

fluvoxamine (Luvox®) – up to 300 mg/day.High doses are often needed for these drugs to work in most people.* Studies suggest that the following doses may be needed: What Are the Usual Doses for These Drugs? For example, duloxetine (Cymbalta®) has been reported to help OCD patients who have not responded to these other medications. In addition to these carefully studied drugs, there are hundreds of case reports of other drugs being helpful.

There is growing evidence that the other drugs are as effective. The following antidepressants have been found to work well for OCD in research studies:Īnafranil has been around the longest and is the best-studied OCD medication. Drugs, such as imipramine (Tofranil®) or amitriptyline (Elavil®), that are good antidepressants, rarely improve OCD symptoms. No! Some commonly used antidepressants have almost no effect whatsoever on OCD symptoms. (Note: Depression can sometimes result from OCD, and doctors can treat both the OCD and depression with the same medication.) Do all antidepressants help OCD symptoms? The types of medication that research has shown to be most effective for OCD are a type of drug called a Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitor (SRI), which are traditionally used as an antidepressants, but also help to address OCD symptoms. They may be able to change your dose or find a different type of SRI that your system better tolerates. If you experience side effects, you should bring this up with your doctor so they can help you address them. About half of OCD patients stop taking their medication due to side effects or for other reasons.

For medications to work, they must be taken regularly and as directed by their doctor.

For the people who benefit from medication, they usually see their OCD symptoms reduced by 40-60%.

About 7 out of 10 people with OCD will benefit from either medication or Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP).

Medication is an effective treatment for OCD.

For information on medication in children, click here. The following information refers to OCD medications in adults.