Wednesday, May 21, 2014

Medical Madness- The big three fibromyalgia drugs don't actually work well

This article is actually about medical marijuana and fibro which I don't want to touch, but it had some other interesting findings. 

..."only one out of ten FM patients taking Lyrica is likely to receive a fifty percent or greater reduction in pain. It’s one out of six for Cymbalta and one out of eight for Savella. That means only a small percentage of FM patients can expect their pain levels to drop really significantly on these drugs." 

And yet doctors are pushing these drugs as a cure all miracle for fibromyalgia. I had a rheumatologist tell me that if Savella didn't help me I didn't have fibromyalgia, and yet in studies Savella has only helped one out of eight patients! It just goes to show there is still a long way to go in fibromyalgia treatment. 

3 comments:

  1. I will testify that I got little to no relief from each of those. The only "Fibro" drug I've seen any long-term relief from is Gabapentin (Neurontin), which greatly helps the nerve pain. Lyrica just gave me side effects. Savella and Cymbalta each helped a little but only for a short time before the side effects out-weighed the benefits.

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    1. I thought the same thing, the side effects were so bad I preferred the pain.

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  2. I know! The sad thing is that doctor was one of the better doctors I encountered.

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