Better with ONE medication versus two or more?

[RunningGirl85]

Has anyone else experienced better results by taking AWAY medications and switching to just one? The first medication I took for seizures was Keppra, and I started that in April 2012. After that I added on Lamictal, which was what really helped, but I was still having several simple partials. After that the Keppra went away and then it was Lamictal and Vimpat - same thing... then Lamictal and Depakote, which seemed to be doing okay (better, anyway, but not great), but the side effects were awful. My neurologist decided to let me try Lamictal alone... and the results have been the best of anything else. This was even before he upped the dose (I stopped taking the Depakote before the Lamictal dosage was upped - I'm still in the process of that). Normally my partials get really bad the week before I start my period, but I didn't have that problem at all this past cycle - maybe one or two short ones, but nothing like I was getting before. I told my neurologist this and he said it might have been in part due to anxiety from all of the other side effects.

Anyway, has anyone else had similar results? I'm actually pretty happy with this - Lamictal has by far agreed with me the best of any other medication. The worst side effects were only at first - headache, some hair loss (which stopped, unlike Depakote, which kept going past a month), sleepiness and nausea... but that all went away pretty quick.

 

[katzy]

I was on combination therapy for a short period of time(like 4-5 months), it was after Oxcarbazepine(Trileptal) gave me a serious rash. I was put on levitiracetam (Keppra), it didn't seem to work so doctor added lamotrigine (Lamictal). After a while she decided that Keppra wasn't really doing anything so she withdrew it gradually. So now I'm on lamictal monotherapy. I didn't notice an increase in seizures during the Keppra-Lamictal combination phase, in fact I was seizure free. That's why she tried withdrawing Keppra. There are a lot of people here on combination therapy so let's see what they have to say.

 

[RunningGirl85]

Yea Keppra and I didn't get along that well. Made me too moody and didn't help much. I'm pretty happy about the monotherapy now actually.

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[katzy]

Yea Keppra and I didn't get along that well. Made me too moody and didn't help much. I'm pretty happy about the monotherapy now actually.

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For me, Keppra did nothing. No side effects, nothing, nada :roflmao: She warned me about aggression, but didn't notice a thing. Are you still on depakote and lamictal? Or was depakote the one you withdrew from?

 

[RunningGirl85]

Just the Lamictal. Thankfully. I gained like six pounds in two weeks, which doesn't sound like much, but when you're 5'1" and have weighed the same for a year and a half. ... and work out a lot, it's a reasonable amount. Plus I was losing hair and I was having terrible blood circulation.

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[katzy]

Just the Lamictal. Thankfully. I gained like six pounds in two weeks, which doesn't sound like much, but when you're 5'1" and have weighed the same for a year and a half. ... and work out a lot, it's a reasonable amount. Plus I was losing hair and I was having terrible blood circulation.

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Oh wow. I'm still losing hair, I guess it's the lamictal. I have sun sensitivity. I can't go out on a sunny day without sunglasses on or I'll be squinting the whole time. Do you have sun sensitivity?

 

[Belinda5000]

I've never been able to get down to just one medication.I tried a lot of drugs and also found out I'm medresistant and allergic to 5 drugs, out of all the blasted drugs I've taken.
I'm allergic to keppra,Depakote,Vimpat,Lamictal,Gabatril.

The three drugs I can take that help Tegretol,Topamax,Phenobarb

 

[kirsten]

Doctors generally try for monotherapy before resorting to more than one med. I'd take a guess that it has to do with reducing side effects. My doctors only started me on two meds (not including emergency meds, which I used to take) about seven months ago. But then you have to consider your seizure types--some meds are great for TCs but not for partials, others are good for tonics, and so on. Lamictal and tegretol were my best meds. They really controlled me well. I took lamictal for about two years and tegretol for about...I don't know...three?

 

[RunningGirl85]

Belinda - well all of those except Gabatril are the drugs that I have tried.

Kirsten - yeah, Keppra was the very first one, but it really didn't help me much. It probably helped stop the TCs, but I was still having several partials until I went on Lamictal. I'm glad we're trying the one med thing though. ... The less stuff in me the better.

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[masterjen]

I think it very much depends on the person, and the cause of the seizures/epilepsy as well as type of seizures. I'm currently on 3 anti-seizure medications, and they very much work in synergy with one another, at least for me. I tend to be very susceptible to side effects, and by keeping the doses of these three at more moderate levels rather than going up to the so-called "ideal" dose on just one or two, I can finally begin to see somewhat better seizure control (finally) with fewer side effects.