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Fycompa

Mon, 10/26/2015 - 10:10

Good morning  - My son, age 31, has refractory epilepsy and his doctor recently prescribed Fycompa.  When you read about it on the internet, the side effects are scary.  Just wondering if anyone is taking it and if so, have you had success, issues, etc.?  Thank you so much for your help.

 

Comments

All medications work. All

Submitted by just_joe on Tue, 2015-10-27 - 13:44
All medications work. All medications also have side effects. That also includes over the counter medications.If you are going by the side effects on medical sites fine they do have them. However if you are going by posts of people who say the medications side effects were terriable or the medications didn't work you do need to understand a few things. I fave been in drug studies for newer medications. We used a diary daily and listed anything that was different during that day. Be it a stomach acke, blured vision  Like I said ANYTHING. The diarys are looked at and the number of people that listed anything was tallied up. Side effects do happen. The number of people who get them ranges from 5-8% with most side effects. So if you see posts regarding a side effect that person is one of the 5-8% who had one. You will rarely see a post from a person who has had no problems with the medication. Which means that 92-95% of the people taking it have had no problems.It takes time for the body to get used to the medication so during the first 4-6 weeks is generally when the side effects do hit the person. After a period of 6-8 weeks th ebody is used to it and the theraputic levels are where the neurologist wants them to be. In other words medications for epilepsy and other disorders are not like aspirin where once taken it is gone after a few hours.A medication that works for one person may not work for the next and the same with dosages. Each person is different and their seizures are also different.The neurologist generally prescribe a medication they know works because it has been working on another patient he has and the dosage it the same as the other patient.I have been on many different medications and their generic equavenlent and they all worked. I was wanting better control of my seizures. They all reduced the number of seizures I was having. I worked with my neurologists in order to get the best control of my seizures and we did work together to get results that have been great for me.I always asked questions. In each visit the neurologist will ask some questions and with teh answers they will determine how things are. If no questions are asked they generally will think things are going good so they keep the RX the same and you come back 6-12 months later. By asking questions they see you want results and they do take more time in order to give you the answers.1. Is this medication the best medication for his seizures?2. His seizures have reduced in number but he still has some so what can be done for the other seizures?3. Are there any procedures that might help control the seizures that work with his medication?That is just a few of my questions. Once they were amswered I had others. For every question Doc asked me I asked him at least 1 and at times more. I do hope this helps Joe 

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