LAMICTAL Reviews (LAMOTRIGINE)Average Rating: 3.4 (1917 Ratings)Filter ResultsCompare LAMICTAL with similar:
Type: Rx Drug
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Results are sorted by Gender with females listed first (reviews with no gender reported listed before females). Key to Ratings: 1=LOW (I would not recommend taking this medicine.) Page: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 |
More on LAMICTAL: Reviews Summary | Drug Safety Information
| RATING | REASON | SIDE EFFECTS FOR LAMICTAL | COMMENTS | SEX | AGE | DURATION/ DOSAGE | DATE ADDED |
| 1 | Bipolar II/Mixed | Rash on neck, legs and stomache. | After two weeks I developed a rash; no symptomatic improvement. | F | 31 | 2 weeks | 1/16/2002 | 1 | Bipolar | severe aniexty, depression, sadness, shakiness,dizziness.. This went on for many many months.. I trusted my Dr. I kept thinking it had to get better.. I wanted to get better. I thought it had to. it lead to suicidal thoughts.. i was monitored monthly by a Dr. I told him what was going on, he kept upping my dosage.. I was up to 400 mg.. He put me on respirdal with it, and 2 weeks later, I was inpatient with suicidal thoughts and ended up at 4 winds Mental Hospital. I am not on topamax and doing very well. some meds dont mix well with everyones brain chemistry. | this medicine is not for everyone | F | 36 | 8 days | 5/16/2005 | 1 | Bipolar | Constant state of fatigue, lack of sexual desire, short term memory loss. I am obsessed with the desire to sleep - anywhere, anytime. | Mood swings were better, however side affects are intolerable. I am weening myself off of lamictal. | F | 38 | 2 years | 7/29/2007 | 1 | deprssion | confusion, sore, neck hurts, itchy skin, inceased depression, yeast infection, dry mouth, increase of appetite | F | 52 | 3 days | 7/30/2007 | 1 | depression | massive hair loss, change in hair texture (wiry, dry) lack of patience, irritability,crying jags, facial and neck rashes, itchy, red, swollen eyelids. | I HONESTLY DO NOT BELIEVE THIS DRUG SHOULD BE PRESCRIBED FOR DEPRESSION. A series of various rashes can occur at any time, whether you have reached your "therapeutic" (God KNOWS what that is) DO NOT let your doctor tell you that you are bipolar if you have NO MANIC symptoms!!! If you just have depression, Lamictal is NOT the drug for you! and adding it on to "help" your antidepressant only insures that you will add on more side effects, and more trouble getting off of yet another drug. I have weaned my self off of lamictal as of this past Wednesday, waiting five days to "clean out", then starting a low dose of Lexapro if I feel that I need to continue a med. | F | 50 | 7 months | 8/3/2007 | 1 | cyclic mood disorder | Extreme fatigue and clumsyness, fever, frequent urinating, trouble expressing myself talking and writing, lots of spelling mistakes, forgetting, feeling like a zombie, constantly misplacing things, burning eyes. | I hate it!!!! I feel like half my brain has been burned away. I sometimes feel like a total idiot. I used to be pretty smart, but I don't feel like that anymore. After taking it in the morning, I can't function for about five or more hours, because I am so tired. I am on 400 mg now, my doc wants to get me up to a "therapeutic dose" of 500 to 700 mg. By then I can just as well stay in bed all day and night because I won't be able to do anything anymore. I will get a second opinion from another doctor, I can't live like this. | F | 48 | 5 months | 6/24/2007 | 1 | bi polar 2 | extremely disoriented, vision problems, stumbling alot, little bumps on my chest and back. At times I was unaware of where I was. Nausea, shaking and twitching at bedtime so bad that I couldn't sleep for days on end. My legs uncontrollably moved in a major way. I wanted to kill most everyone due to irritability, and I am not that way ever. I started Lithium at the same time, and after I stopped taking this I felt better only hours later. I took this Lamictal for 3 weeks, and was out of commission nearly everyday. It's a guinea pig drug, and is only approved by the FDA for epilepsy anyway. I have to start school in a week, so I quit taking it, and I can function now. I don't recommend taking this drug for a single thing. It nearly killed me because I almost got ran over crossing the street. | F | 20 | 3 weeks | 8/14/2007 | 1 | Depression/Anxiety | Headaches, fatigue, major irratibility, mood swings, increased anxiety, major weight gain, loss of concentration, joint and muscle pain, irregular periods, loss of sexual desire | When I first started the "starter" pack, I thought this stuff was great. I had been on Wellbutrin and it had puttered out and wasn't effective anymore. My Lamictal was increased to 150mg about 4 months ago and I have had a terrible time ever since. I kept trying to give it time to do it's thing, but I'm going to request that my doctor take me off of it ASAP. I'm miserable and the side effects are not worth it at all! I don't recommend this drug to anyone who has had luck with Welbutrin before. I was told that it would be basically the same thing and it hasn't by any stretch of the imagination. I go through terrible mood swings and my boyfriend thinks I'm losing my mind sometimes. I'm on a Lamictal/Paxil cocktail and so at first we thought the weight gain was from the Paxil. We lowered that dose and I'm still gaining weight. My psychiatrist assured me that weight gain wasn't a side effect but after reading several of these posts, I know that I'm not crazy anymore to | F | 33 | 6 months | 10/23/2007 | 1 | bipolar | the side effects are that a 30 day supply costs $396 if you don't have insurance. | Lamictal seems to work fine, but I would rather go manic and have money than spend every f'ing dime I have on medicine like this. I am so upset right now because I feel like I am being raped by these drug companies. | F | 31 | 2 months | 10/26/2007 | 1 | treatment for autism/tourettes | My 17-year old son (who has autism/tourette's)experienced a dramatic increase in verbal and motor tics when put on this medication. He was unable to sleep at night. He was unable to function at school due to extreme lack of attention. Was unable to respond to simple instructions or cues...he was so "out of it". He is now tapering off the lamictal until totally off of it. Teacher reports significant improvement and he is almost back to "normal" functioning. We are still researching effective medications to assist with verbal tics (does anybody know of any)? He is on a high dose of Geodon which has been a wonderful medication for him. Doctor is concerned about the high dosage (260 mg over the course of 24 hours) and is tinkering with other meds which is how we wound up with the disaster with Lamictal. | BEWARE OF LAMICTAL! This medication is over-rated. Physicians love to prescribe it and I believe it is because it is highly marketed and visible in the media as a medication for conditions other than seizures. For example, it is marketed as a medication for bi-polar disorder. This medication was not helpful in the treatment of autism and tourette's in my son. In fact, it was detrimental. I am extremely angry that it was prescribed for my son. We went through a lot of unnecessary turmoil with school/home issues because of this experience with Lamictal. | F | 51 | 12 weeks | 11/12/2007 | 1 | Bipolar II | Sensitive stomach, severe depression, crying, inability to inarticulate, very hard to get up in the morning, urge to sleep all day for hours. | I am still furious about what I went thru with this drug. Furious. I have been on SSRI's for 12 years and what Lamictal made me feel was how depressed I was before being on SSRI's. It's been 5 days now since I've been off Lamictal and I'm still trying to get back to normal. I finally have my normal, hopeful, optimistic mood back but I haven't been able to articulate as well which is frustrating. I began a job 3 days ago but couldn't cope with it because of withdrawing from this horrible medication. I feel like a guinea pig with this. Like they just throw meds at people after meeting them twice. Then when I finally had presence of mind to call Dr's office, his horrible assistant chastised and criticized me for going off the drug at all. And for not calling them about it on a Saturday night. That's a whole other issue, her abusiveness. So I'm still on my Lexapro which I've had great luck with. My Dr. still thinks I'm bipolar II so I'm sure they'll try to give me something else soon and I | F | 42 | 11 days | 6/1/2007 | 1 | Epilepsy | Very aggressive. Loss of short time memory. Creepy payns like ants crauling underneeth my skin. Payns in the joints. Opstipation. Musclecontraktions and convultions. | When young I underwent military combattraining in a forreign country. That meens when loosing my mind completely as the result of Lamictal treatment, I turned from a kind loving person to a dangerous monster because I didn*t remember what doing. One week after starting treatment I became State property in a high security ward. There I smashed the furniture, dishes and attacked the staff, and when the doctor asked me I couldn*t tell the day, and I hardly remembered my name. And I also became so goodharted that I gave away money to complete unknown persons because I felt pity for people who hadn*t got cigarettes. I tried desperately to tell the staff the medicine made me crazy, but noone belived me until after being forced to take this, (also with a letter from the local police that gave me drinking prohibition and order to follow up medication), I became severely ill and got a high fever. I felt I was burning from inside and I was in agony. Then the doctors reacted, and I had been on th | F | 53 | 2 months | 8/10/2007 | 1 | Unipolar/Bipolar? | Started with mild fluid retention, then cognitive problems, swelling in limbs, tingling in hands and feet, cold, mixed up unclear thoughts, forgetful,over emotional. THEN....muscle cramping and spasms along with extreme fluid in legs and stomach - stopped being able to walk without cramping legs and extreme pain. 3 sizes larger in 5 months. Understand, I am an avid biker, aerobics, and fitness oriented person. And I was only looking for a rash... | Not enough information on the pharmacy handout. Dr. never mentioned physical side effects other than rash. This went on way to long, thought it was everything but this med....High Half life, hard to get out of system. Happy for those that can take this, I truly think we are not getting the full low down and information on this one...way to scarey | F | 51 | 5 months | 6/14/2007 | 1 | Slight Mood Disorder, OCD, | Tired ALL the time; Zombie like state, Can't articulate or concentrate, blurred vision, swollen ankles, 10 pound weight loss (YAY!), the most IRRITABLE I've ever been in my entire life | I was on Celexa for what I was told was a slight mood disorder about 7 years ago; I would get irrationally angry and upset over little things. I am now seeing a new psych, that wants to take me off of celexa, she says being on it for that long that has made me immune to it's effectiveness (anyone ever hear of that?). So I am weaning off of Celexa (I was at 60mg, tapering down and now I'm on 20mg, and she wants me totally off of it), and upping the Lamictal. Started at 25mg, gradually increasing to 100mg, but I am on 75mg at this point. I hate it. I am super cranky at the littlest things. I don't know though if it's because I'm taking less Celexa, or if it's the Lamictal! I'm just SUPER cranky and hate everyone and everything (slight exaggeration, but that is my general mood, at least when I can stay awake!) Please email me if you have any insights or help. Thanks!! | F | 43 | 1 months | 7/21/2007 | 1 | Bipolar/BPD | Slurred Speech within 1 week of starting. My husband rushed my to the ER thinking I'd had a stroke (I'm 29). After two days of rest, I was able to start speaking somewhat normally. NEVER TAKE, not worth the risk. Try Trileptal--few side effects. | Do not take if you can help it! | F | 19 | 7 days | 5/27/2007 | 1 | bipolar/depression/ocd/postpartum | i gained weight. i cannot concentrate. i cannot focus. words are hard to communicate. extremely forgetful! weight gain! depression. EXTREME mood swings! feelings of rage | i feel i am in a "hole" with the world functioning around me and i am not a participant. | F | 33 | 3 years | 5/4/2007 | 1 | Seizures | Horrible Rash that began within a few days of taken it. Could not sleep at night mostly because of the rash. It was difficult to think clearly and felt spaced out most of the time. I experienced fever along with continued worsening of the rash and swelling of my lymph nodes that finally convinced my doctor to discontinue use. | F | 28 | 6 weeks | 7/20/2004 | 1 | Bipolar Disorder | Headache,Metal taste & Excess Saliva,Memory problems,Aching neck and muscles and joints, | Everyone who has been prescribed the drug should get full info about it's possible side effects- I did not, got a starter pack and trusted the doc-wish I would have looked into it before now. | F | 46 | 26 days | 10/24/2004 | 1 | Bi polar | weight gain? dislexia, irritability, fatigue, vivid dreams | i was taking lamictal in conjunciton with Zoloft for about a year and a half or so. the zoloft was for OCD. there were no rashes or anything like that, but i noticed that the longer i took it the less it worked. i was at 200 miligrams at one point and still nothing. i didn't want to increase the dosage. i've stopped taking this medication mainly because my psychiatrist flaked out on me and i was never able to get a refil. the good thing i have to say about this medication is that it helped me to "focus" i was more easily able to tell when a mood swing was coming. so becauase my mind has been opened to that i can still sense when it's going to happen even though i'm not on medication. i'm currently getting accupuncture for my depression and the mania sort of worked itself out. i still have some pretty big swings here and there, but my bi polar disorder has improved greatly since i've stoped taking this drug and started accupuncture. being bi polar sucks and it's totally a ca | F | 24 | 1.5 years | 7/18/2006 | 1 | Bipolar | I have had severe hair thinning, severe weight gain, and increased exhaustion. | I was on Zoloft before Lamictal, and then Lamictal in addition to Zoloft after hospitalization for attemtped suicide. I am taking 200 mg of Lamictal and 100 mg of Zoloft, and these problems were not prominent with Zoloft, so I am sure that Lamictal is causing these side effects. In the four months that I have been on Lamictal, I have gained 40 pounds, lost a severe amount of hair volume, and my exhaustion has increased to the point where I cannot sit up in class for the full 55 minutes, and often cannot move after getting home. | F | 17 | 4 months | 4/17/2007 |