'A Patient Voice' Community

I have been using gabapentin for almost 4 yrs now. It was prescribed for nerve pain. My wife takes it. Her doctor prescribed it for migraine headaches. We have both stopped and restarted it with no ill effects. I had shingles about 10 yrs ago but never did use gabapentin then. It seems to me that it might be very helpful for shingles pain. I speak, of course, as a patient, not a doctor. I do know the misery of shingles pain. I suffered for nearly a year. When it's over, talk to your doctor about getting a vaccine shot.

hello, S --

from what i can understand in your post --

-- you developed shingles two weeks ago,

-- you developed terrible headaches, probably from the meds you were taking for the shingles,

-- your dr prescribed gabapentin/neurontin (see PS1) to treat the headaches,

-- now you want to quit the gabapentin and are concerned about possible withdrawal effects, esp seizures.

i am not a medical person, but let me advise you of two things, as far as i understand them. first, you have been taking this med for only two weeks. this tells me that it won't take long, if at all, to discontinue the gabapentin altogether. second, no matter how long it takes to discontinue the gabapentin, as long as you taper yourself off it, you are very unlikely to have seizures from the discontinuation. however, do not quit taking it all at once.

now -- as to tapering down from your current dosage of gabapentin, i am guessing from the materials at http://www.drugs.com/gabapentin.html that your current dosage is somewhere between 900-1,800 mg. my suggestion is that you take from one to two weeks to discontinue taking it. cut your dosage (PS2) in half on the first day, stay there for a couple of days, then go to another half (a fourth of the original dosage) for a few days, to one eighth, one sixteenth. by that time you should be in fine shape to come off it completely.

if you have any problems -- weird sensations, confusion, loss of consciousness -- call your dr. you may have to go back a step or go back to the last comfortable dosage and start over with smaller reductions. your dr may need to give you a low dose of prozac/fluoxetine (10 mg) to help, and when you have completely withdrawn from the gabapentin, the prozac is easy to discontinue.

frankly, S, on a schedule like this, my belief is that it is extremely unlikely that you will have trouble withdrawing from gabapentin (PS3). however, if you begin to get scared or it looks as if things aren't going as planned, call your dr or go to the ER.

please keep us posted on how you are doing.

-- susie margaret

PS1 -- webMD info on gabapentin/neurontin is at http://www.webmd.com/drugs/mono-8217-GABAPENTIN - ORAL.aspx?drugid=14208&drugname=Gabapentin Oral&source=2 . it is used as an anticonvulsant
and to relieve the nerve pain associated with shingles.

PS2 -- if you are taking capsules instead of pills, you can empty the capsule and divide up the little grains into portions, but this is a major annoyance!

PS3 -- i discontinued effexor/venlafaxine, which is notorious for being hard to quit, but i did it over a period of six to eight weeks and never had a problem.