Difference between Baclofen and Campral?

[Guest]

Difference between Baclofen and Campral?

I have not been in the position yet but beleive me, I normally look for any excuse to drink and if I had to tell some one I wasnt drinking because I quit, I would be mortified but I feel like I just dont care. I will just tell them that I choose not to drink! It is weird but I really feel positive about not drinking. I am going on a business trip next week, over a weekend, no one has to know if I drink but I actually dont want to drink when I go, and I dont care that the person I am meeting down there loves to have a social drink, I just am not going to drink!. Beleive me, 4 weeks ago< i would not be saying this and actually look forward to getting drunk without having anyone to nag me about it.
Nykat,
I was the same way - couldnt imagine it but here i am...

[nykat]

Difference between Baclofen and Campral?

Okay,picked up Bac. Here goes nothing!!!! Thanks for talking to me!

[Guest]

Difference between Baclofen and Campral?

Always here.

[bernard]

Difference between Baclofen and Campral?

eight days a week;815085 wrote: my former alcohol specialist (very experienced with Campral) told me too. He said I could try it before detox and then abstinence, but there was little point, and that it probably wouldn't work.

My present alcohol specialist has prescribed me Baclofen while still drinking, even though he thinks that it's more successful after detoxing/beginning abstinence.

So, eight days, do you mean that your previous physician thinks that in general Campral probably is ineffective? I continue to be exasperated at how advanced the physicians in GB are compared to the US in alcohol addiction.

Here's what the noted psychopharmacologist, Stephen Stahl (2008) writes about Campral (acamprosate):

Therapeutic nihilism also applies to a great extent to the use of other agents approved for treating alcohol dependence, including acamprosate, whose U.S. manufacturer has greatly curtailed promotional efforts due to lack of uptake of this agent by the psychopharmacology community. Acamprosate is a derivative of the amino acid taurine and interacts with both the glutamate system to inhibit it and with the GABA system to enhance it; it is somewhat like a form of "artificial alcohol." Thus when alcohol is taken chronically and then withdrawn, the adaptive changes that it causes in both the glutamate system and the GABA system create a state of glutamate overexcitement and even excitotoxicity as well as GABA deficiency. Too much glutamate can cause neuronal damage...

So England has universal health care, no guns, and alcohol specialists, while the US has pay-to-play health care, plenty of guns, and "therapeutic nihilism." Yeah for Republicans.

[eight days a week]

Difference between Baclofen and Campral?

bernard;815856 wrote: So, eight days, do you mean that your previous physician thinks that in general Campral probably is ineffective? I continue to be exasperated at how advanced the physicians in GB are compared to the US in alcohol addiction.

Here's what the noted psychopharmacologist, Stephen Stahl (2008) writes about Campral (acamprosate):

Therapeutic nihilism also applies to a great extent to the use of other agents approved for treating alcohol dependence, including acamprosate, whose U.S. manufacturer has greatly curtailed promotional efforts due to lack of uptake of this agent by the psychopharmacology community. Acamprosate is a derivative of the amino acid taurine and interacts with both the glutamate system to inhibit it and with the GABA system to enhance it; it is somewhat like a form of "artificial alcohol." Thus when alcohol is taken chronically and then withdrawn, the adaptive changes that it causes in both the glutamate system and the GABA system create a state of glutamate overexcitement and even excitotoxicity as well as GABA deficiency. Too much glutamate can cause neuronal damage...

So England has universal health care, no guns, and alcohol specialists, while the US has pay-to-play health care, plenty of guns, and "therapeutic nihilism." Yeah for Republicans.

My previous alcohol specialist indeed told me that there would be little point taking Campral while drinking, bernard. As I understand it, the idea with Campral is that it rebalances the brain while abstinent/compensates for the lack of alcohol that you're used to, and makes abstinence easier. (I'm no expert in the mechanism of Campral, and stand to be corrected if I'm wrong).

I should point out that this specialist was a private doctor, as is my present one. I do see the NHS (National Health Service) doctors as well, but in my experience they are generally useless. I'm just lucky that I can afford to pay/am sometimes lucky enough to be covered by insurance and can go private too.

In fact, in some ways the US is way ahead of us here! Naltrexone is approved for use in alcohol dependency over there, over here it's not so we generally have to go private to even have a chance of being prescribed it, or are forced to order from the internet!

[hoping4better]

Difference between Baclofen and Campral?

I don't know the chemical structure of campral, but I do know that it did nothing for me. My dr said today that many of her patients are not having success with campral and she is not prescribing it as often.

[vette]

Difference between Baclofen and Campral?

As I have posted before, Campral was a Godsend for me. After 25 years of heavy drinking I stopped during a month of rehab and have been just over a year without a single craving.....no meetings, no aftercare, just happy everyday to be enjoying life. I cut the dosage in half a few weeks ago because my Dr. said to after 1 year at full dose. Just one person, but it worked for me.

[Lion Queen]

Difference between Baclofen and Campral?

just to show we are all different. something may work for one person but not another. i feel sure that there is a medication for everyone to 'hit the switch'.

[Tulipe]

Difference between Baclofen and Campral?

Uh, hi there. Just chiming in on my experience with Campral.
It helped. It worked. But you do have to abstain, or be close to it. The problem I had was that if I did have a drink, I could not feel it so I became a binger, which I have never been before. Now I am off it, and am not drinking at all or when I do not overdrinking. It taught me how I can abstain successfully, so now I do whenever I feel it's good to do so. No more binging now though.
On health care - yeah, maybe the US is advanced, but those of us with an addiction could never seek help until something terrible happens for fear of it being forever a black mark when looking for a job, or whatever. Or changing health insurance when one changes jobs. Or getting health insurance when one retires. So what good is all this helpful stuff if no one uses it? I would NEVER have asked a US doctor for help. Only in Europe did I feel safe enough to seek assistance.

[eight days a week]

Difference between Baclofen and Campral?

Tulipe;817905 wrote: ...
On health care - yeah, maybe the US is advanced, but those of us with an addiction could never seek help until something terrible happens for fear of it being forever a black mark when looking for a job, or whatever. Or changing health insurance when one changes jobs. Or getting health insurance when one retires. So what good is all this helpful stuff if no one uses it? I would NEVER have asked a US doctor for help. Only in Europe did I feel safe enough to seek assistance.

Really great post Tulipe, all of it!

You raise a hugely important point - people being denied life insurance etc because they have alcoholism (or even just drugs to treat it - whatever they were prescribed for) on their record in the US. That's why many of my US friends choose to order online, keep it from their doctor, and so off their health records (which seem to me to be shared across a worrying amount of public and private agencies).

The same thing is happening in the UK. All health records are soon going to be uploaded to a central system, which will be open not only to hospitals and other doctors, but all sorts of agencies that have nothing to do with health provision. People need to opt out of this and opt out asap imho (note to self to do so!)

[Tulipe]

Difference between Baclofen and Campral?

Hey 8 days, thanks for the response. The sad thing is that only people with a credit card, who have disposable income, can afford to do it 'off record'.

Is that fair? That means only the people people on the low side of banks savings get branded, and can't pull themselves up, while the people on the richer side can help themselves, and maybe escape the label. BUT the vast majority of people with addictions, who cannot pay on their own, but have not fallen into desperation, live a secret life of destruction. Why do we throw away the backbone of our society?

[eight days a week]

Difference between Baclofen and Campral?

Tulipe;817972 wrote: Hey 8 days, thanks for the response. The sad thing is that only people with a credit card, who have disposable income, can afford to do it 'off record'.

Is that fair? That means only the people people on the low side of banks savings get branded, and can't pull themselves up, while the people on the richer side can help themselves, and maybe escape the label. BUT the vast majority of people with addictions, who cannot pay on their own, but have not fallen into desperation, live a secret life of destruction. Why do we throw away the backbone of our society?

Yes my friend, it's shocking, and very very sad You have touched on a subject very close to my heart here. I'm very lucky, although I have little money myself I have a roof over my head, and food on the table, always. I can see the public or private doctors I need to through the financial support of my family or my private insurance.

If I wasn't in such a situation I may very well already be dead due to the trouble I got myself into with drink the year before last, and again last year and the beginning of this one.

Why is my life any more precious than someone who was born slightly less privileged? Personally I think (sorry - I mean I know) it isn't. I've just been so very lucky.

Once I'm better I'll be devoting my future to helping those less fortunate than myself, but it is so frustrating that the system is set up to fail folk like that almost by default.

It's heartbreaking.

[Guest]

Difference between Baclofen and Campral?

I think the focus should be more on your health than not getting life insurance. I would think one would want to be free of alcohol and all the diseases it causes rather than worrying about not being approved for life insurance. Plus the danger of taking medication without consulting a doctor... Guess this is one of those reasonings that I dont understand... Just an opinion!

[reneesmiles]

Difference between Baclofen and Campral?

Campral did not work AT ALL for me. Naltrexone + Baclofen works wonders.

[eight days a week]

Difference between Baclofen and Campral?

Hoping for the best;818079 wrote: I think the focus should be more on your health than not getting life insurance. I would think one would want to be free of alcohol and all the diseases it causes rather than worrying about not being approved for life insurance. Plus the danger of taking medication without consulting a doctor... Guess this is one of those reasonings that I dont understand... Just an opinion!

I completely understand your reasoning, but the two private specialists I've been under haven't given me any information or advice that I hadn't already found from my own research - just a prescription. I guess this depends on how well you can research and evaluate things yourself. But from my own point of view, I might just as well not have bothered consulting experts, and self-medicated. That way I get my health back without any possible (and unfair) legal comeback.

I think I even read about someone in the US who had trouble with his driving licence (license) or insurance because Nal was on his medical record...that is scary stuff. If anyone wants more details PM me and I'll find you the link.