Off-label depression, schizophrenia drug being peddled as sleep aid
Are you being given a drug for schizophrenics to help you sleep?
If you’re using a prescription med to drift off to dreamland, there’s a good chance you are.
A shocking new study shows that a 35-year-old drug named trazodone has become one of the hottest sleeping pills in America.
But this drug has a dirty secret that most docs probably aren’t sharing with patients. Trazodone is NOT a sleeping pill — it’s a dangerous antidepressant that’s often used to help treat the worst symptoms of schizophrenia.
The fact that the drug is being handed out like candy to people with no history of psychological disorders is bad enough.
But many patients are learning the hard way that trazodone is nearly impossible to quit. And it could even leave you suicidal.
Crying ourselves to sleepDocs are giving trazodone to insomniacs for one reason only — because it happens to make you drowsy as a side effect.
That’s a little like giving someone chemotherapy to help them lose weight.
But trazodone isn’t some gentle sleep aid. It’s part of a powerful class of antidepressants called selective serotonin re-uptake inhibitors (SSRIs) — just like Paxil, Prozac and Zoloft. It’s been around since the early 1980s and is often used to help calm people with schizophrenia.
But because it makes you so tired and loopy, docs are handing out trazodone as a sleep drug in record numbers, even though it’s never been proven safe for people who aren’t depressed.
In fact, a recent study in the journal Sleep tracked 32,000 older adults for 10 years and found that the blockbuster Ambien and trazodone are the most prescribed sleep drugs in America.
And if that doesn’t get Lunesta’s ad agency fired, I don’t know what will.
But when you’re given a prescription for trazodone, you’re not just being handed a drug that was never meant for you. You’re being handed a drug you may never be able to quit.
You’re not supposed to stay on any sleeping pill for life. But just like with any antidepressant, getting off trazodone is a nightmare.
Some of the most common withdrawal symptoms are memory loss, dizziness, rage, crying spells, and even thoughts of suicide.
And these risks aren’t exactly news. Even the National Institutes of Health warns that “you may become suicidal, especially at the beginning of your treatment and any time that your dose is increased or decreased.”
In other words, be on guard 24 hours a day — especially during withdrawal. Who could sleep worrying about that?
Karen Huber, a woman in her 50s from Arkansas, said she was so overcome with anger and irritation when she quit trazodone that she could have “chewed through a brick.” Another trazodone patient reported feeling so unstable after missing just one dose of the med that she had to check herself into a hospital.
That’s a risk none of us should have to accept just to catch a few Zs. If you’re taking trazodone to help you sleep, here are two things you can do right away.
- Talk to your doc about quitting — but don’t stop the drug cold turkey. You need to go through a gradual process of weaning yourself off trazodone a little at a time to avoid the worst withdrawal symptoms. And pay close attention to any changes in mood you may be feeling.
- Look into safe, natural remedies like L-theanine and melatonin to help you get a good night’s sleep. L-theanine helps you relax and melatonin supports your body’s natural sleep cycles. They’ve both been proven to help you fall asleep fast — and, even more importantly, sleep through the night.
Sources:
“Trazodone: Common sleep drug is little-known antidepressant” Lisa Gill, August 16, 2015, Consumer Reports, news.yahoo.com
