Pharma Effects

Archive for the ‘Singulair’ Category

Adult onset asthma symptoms most always come as a surprise the first time you develop them. Everyone is on the watch for asthma symptoms in youngsters, but people ofttimes miss it at first in adults. Adults with shortness of breath, wheezy breathing, or coughing sometimes panic, completely uncertain of what is going on with them. Now And Again, they even falsely assume that they are experiencing a heart attack!

The reality of the situation is that adult asthma attack symptoms are matters that you should get checked out at the doctor no matter what they signify. Shortness of breath, wheezing, a tight feeling in the chest, and excessive coughing can all be signs of many different diseases, one of which is asthma. Only your physician can tell you for certain whether or not you are developing adult onset asthma.

With this in mind though there are some really good indicators to tell you if your condition is asthmatic in nature. Take into consideration what brought it on. Were you exercising? Did it come on you after you ate something specific? If you go outside on a cold wintery day does it happen when you breathe in? These are some questions that you can ask yourself to give you a clue on whether or not you might have developed asthma.

There are many different treatments for asthma out there and, like most chronic conditions, it usually requires a combination of things. One of the most neglected asthma treatments is diet. Having a diet that avoids things that trigger adult asthma symptoms is important, but it is not enough. Eating a lot of greasy processed foods will often put you at a greater risk of asthma, so it is important to eat a diet rich in fruits and vegetables, as well as grains of all sorts.

Of course, medicine is also an important tool in treating adult asthma symptoms. Most of the time, doctors will prescribe an asthma inhaler or two. When I used to have childhood asthma, my doctor prescribed a maintenance inhaler which would stop me from getting relapses, and an inhaler that I could use in case of a sudden onset of severe symptoms. This is a pretty typical approach, but there are a lot of different ways that you can go about treating adult asthma symptoms. There are even natural asthma treatments out there consisting of various different herbs that will counteract respiratory conditions. It all comes down to finding what works best for you.

The Food and Drug Administration issued an ‘early communication’ yesterday that they were “investigating a possible association between the use of Singulair and behavior/mood changes, suicidality (suicidal thinking and behavior) and suicide.”

It is important to note that this ‘early communication’ is not any kind of alert or warning and that no link has yet been found between Singulair and suicide. Instead, as with all medicines, the FDA tries to trace back reports of problems that people have while they take a medicine to see if they are actually caused by the medicine or are just a coincidence. The report on Singulair should be done in about 9 months.

While your kids don’t need to stop taking Singulair for their allergies or asthma, it is a good reminder to monitor them for any new symptoms or problems that they develop once they start taking Singulair or any other medicine. And then report those problems or side effects to your pediatrician and the FDA through the Medwatch Reporting System.
source

Now I know there is no “official link” between Singulair and suicidal thoughts, but let me tell you my brother Matt’s story.

Four years ago he had a terrible asthma attack.  We really thought that we were going to lose him.  He was only 11 years old at the time.  He was in the hospital for about a month, his lungs began to fill up with fluid and they had to induce a coma.  It was very touch go for about two weeks.  They had him on a number of prescription drugs during his stay.  One of those drugs was the prescription drug Singulair.  When he finally came out a hospital one month later he had been on Singulair or about three weeks.  The doctors had told us that he is asthmatic and would need to be on Singulair and also some steroid that I really can’t remember the name of at this time.

We were so very grateful that the doctors saved his life, but we noticed something very strange.  He came out of the hospital a totally different Child.  He cried constantly, he had nightmares, he was hallucinating.  We did not know what the hell was going on with him.  So we took him back to the doctor.  They told us it was very normal for a child to experience depression after a traumatic event.  OK so we thought he would get over it.  Well we were wrong.

Six months later he began to get worse.  He was afraid to go to sleep, and he was terrified of school.  Getting him up in the morning was not easy to do.  When we were finally able to wake him up everything seemed OK, but 5 minutes before the bus came he would go into these panic attacks.  It would just break your heart.  We tried to drive him to school drop him off and hope everything would be OK, that once he got into school the tears would stop.  Well they didn’t stop, and it just got worse.  He would go down to the principal’s office and beg to sit in her office all day.  For some reason he was terrified of being around all the other children.

The school than approached us offering to have him home schooled.  At this point we really had no choice the panic attacks were everyday, and he was learning nothing.  You could imagine at this point we all were feeling lost and helpless.

So for two years we had him home schooled.  It worked well but in my opinion is not a substitute for the real thing.  Children need that social interaction with their peers.

One morning I was sitting having my morning coffee and watching the news.  They had a short blurb on the TV about Singulair saying that they were researching possible links between Singulair and suicide, and also depression.  After I heard that my world went into a tailspin.  I immediately called my doctor and he advised me to take Matt off of Singulair right away.  So I did.

Now come to find out Merck had known about the side effects the whole time and never conveyed the information.  Within three days of Matthew being off of Singulair he was back to his normal self.  I was stunned that it was that easy!  Now came the anger.  Why we were not told of these side effects?  This child lost 3 years of his life sitting in the house in fear, wanting to die.

So how is he doing now?  Well he is back in school, he has straight A’s, he is happier then I have ever seen him.

I’m not trying to bash this prescription drug, or have it pulled off of the shelf, I just want information to flow freely, and not be held up because pharmaceutical companies do not want to hurt their bottom line.

Please also take a look at this video.  This is a report cbs news did on my brother.