AboutDr Alan Galbraith Expertise I can answer most questions on most drugs. Answers can be given in either technical or layperson terminology. My main areas of interest are psychiatric, gastrointestinal and cardiovascular drugs.
Experience I have been a university lecturer/head of department for almost thirty years, but am now retired. My research interests were alcohol, smoking and cardiovascular disease.
Organizations Institute of Biology, London.
Publications Author of "Fundamentals of Pharmacology" 5th Edition published in November 2007 by Pearson Education, Australia.
Question hi..hope you can help! i know someone who is taking wellbutrin 150 mg/day for seasonal depression; also taking cymbalta as general anti depressant for chemical imbalance in the brain. now, she cannot sleep and takes lunestra 3 mg at bedtime. she sleeps restless and wakes up about 6 hours after taking the lunestra. now..is she taking so much anti depressant (total 180 mg./day) that this is causing the restless sleep? i used to take paxil for ptsd and one day accidentally took 1 paxil too many; spent the night washing and waxing the car. my idea is to take her off the wellbutrin and stay on the cymbalta, but i am not a pharmacist and do not know if that is ok or not; i have a theory that 180 mg/day is too much and not allowing her to come down enough to go to sleep. what do you recommend on this? thank you much!!
Answer Dear James
Wellbutrin can commonly cause insomnia whereas Cymbalta is not usually associated with this but often the opposite. I do not understand completely her dosing. Is she on 150mg Wellbutrin plus 30 mg of Cymbalta? I am presuming this is the case. Professional advice should be sought before chopping and changing drugs but my opinion would be to get her away from the Wellbutrin and onto 60 mg of Cymbalta. She may still need the Lunestra but would be better away from it if possible but it is not a hypnotic associated much with addiction or tolerance or withdrawal insomnia. Think about what i am saying and speak to her prescriber or get her to peak herself about your real concerns from which there may be suitable answers. Ambien is now available in a slow release form which may be better than Lunestra. When drugs behave like they are with your friend it is time to think about options and my opinion always tends to believe on weaning one off as many drugs as possible but still maintaining the desired clinical effect without too many adverse effects.
