Posted by europerep on December 19, 2011, at 16:09:25
In reply to Opiates aren't that hard to get. » Bob, posted by Phidippus on December 17, 2011, at 16:19:32
Hello there,
I would actually agree with the headline of Phid's post. I'm not sure how he got ketamine prescribed, because over here at least, it's not a drug that you can get prescribed and that is stocked in a pharmacy. It's like with the fentanyl derivatives, ketamine is used only for anaesthesia in hospitals and clinics. At any rate, ketamine is indeed not that hard to get. If not from a doctor, then from the Internet. But that's all a different story...
The point is, Scott, I don't really understand what it is that you are trying to do. You are hovering around at what you described in the Viibryd thread as "25%", and this has been more or less the same with the very wide range of drugs and combinations that you have taken. I will stress that I am not a doctor, but how can you realistically expect that any drug that is targeting the neurotransmitters you have now been targeting for so long, is ever going to produce more than 25%, or maybe 27% or 31%. Lowering aripiprazole might add a couple of percentage points, or it might not. In any case, it won't be the solution.
So, if you are going to go with another pharmacological treatment (which would be a decision that I agree with), target parts of the brain that you haven't been targeting. A mild opioid could be a good start. A fairly potent but atypical opioid would be another. And if your doctor won't prescribe you buprenorphine then... go to another doctor. Hell, call the guys at McLean's if necessary, and ask whether they are still treating select TRD patients with buprenorphine. I understand you have been for treatment at the NIH, and you have documentations from that? Great, that is about the best documentation you could get showing that you have been ill for a long time and that your illness is serious enough to warrant "experimental" treatment. But please, do something different from what you have been trying now for so long!
I can say that it is *very* frustrating to read your posts going from one mainly serotonergic drug to the next, expecting that somehow it might be a "magic potion". Well, yeah it might, but it is very very unlikely. And I am not saying that it is frustrating to see you like that in order to make you feel bad. I am saying it because there is at least a chance that there is something out there that can help you. Find it! Is that difficult while in depression? Of course, but if you have the power to write all those posts on here, you also have the power to sum up your treatment history and call or email it to some psychiatrists across the US to see what they could offer you.
ER
poster:europerep
thread:1004067
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20111208/msgs/1005239.html