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As long as Amantadine(Symmetrel) is on the table, I'd like to share my experience. When I was diagnosed in 1982, I was put on Amantadine, and it was the only drug needed for almost a year. I continued taking it with sinemet for the next few years. In 1986 having moved to CT, my new Doctor here thought that a "straight" anti-cholinergic would work better to counter the leg and foot cramps. At that time, Amantadine had not gone generic, and was very expensive vs. Artane which was available in generic form. So I dropped Amantadine, @ Dec/86. Almost 10 years later, (am now a patient at Yale Movement Disorders Clinic in New Haven), I had been going through a very bad year plus of real bad on-off- the offs were often near total immobility,very precipitous, and erratic as to timing. In frustration, I would gobble more Sinemet- which led to tiring bouts of dyskensia, peripheral vision hallucinations, and "faces" staring at me from anything showing wood-grain. And the final side effect, where I felt detached from my body, as if I was a film director shooting a scene, and my body the actor, being told what to do. At my last visit to the Yale clinic in June we agreed that it was time to look seriously at a Pallidotomy. Then almost as an afterthough, my Doctor asked if I had ever taken Amantadine. Sometimes he said patients that returned to it got a good temporary boost. What a boost,( I take 100mg - 2xday) for the first week or so not a single off!! And without adding any extra Sinemet. The offs did return, but they are more predictable and less "total", more real slowdowns, than Freezes. The side effects which I covered in the other posting today are manageable by drinking gallons and gallons of water, Gatoraide, juice. Steve Holahan 49/14