Make Sleep Meds Work For You

I’ve been busier than I like, and haven’t had as much time for posting.  But I spend a lot of time answering emails from my patients, and some of my responses may be useful for others.  Below I’ll share my answer to a patient who has been unable to get quality sleep.  Next week I’ll find another answer to share with readers. This patient asked whether her insurance would cover Lunesta.  She wrote at 2 AM that she is up most of the night tossing and turning. She now takes 10 mg of Ambien, and wrote that it ‘stopped working’.  She doesn’t think 20 mg of Ambien would be covered by insurance (although Ambien is very inexpensive when purchased for cash).  She takes gabapentin for a pain condition and wonders if increasing it would help with sleep. My response: Before getting into a discussion about insurance I want to make sure you have a good understanding about the issues you’re facing when you take sleep medications.  Most sleep medications are subject to tolerance, and some share ‘cross tolerance’.  Lunesta (s-zopiclone) and Ambien (zolpidem) act at the same receptor and have the same actions, so if a person is used to one, she is used to the other.  The situation is analogous to opioids, where a person tolerant to a significant dose of oxycodone will find little effect from morphine. I have taken Lunesta but stopped it for the same reason you are unhappy with Ambien:  it just didn’t do much.  Lunesta also cause...
Source: Suboxone Talk Zone - Category: Addiction Authors: Tags: pharmacology Research ambien best sleep medication insomnia treatments lunesta sleep medication no working sleeping pills Source Type: blogs