Anyway, while I was in the process of increasing my Baclofen doses I became worried about drinking while taking Baclofen so I backed off. I did some more research and thought about it some and ultimately I went back up while drinking and hit the switch.
Here are my thoughts about it. First, it was important to me to find out if Dr. Ameisen was drinking when he hit his switch. He was not, however, he is not clear about that in his book and NOWHERE (that I have seen) does he mention that drinking while taking Baclofen would be a negative thing. In fact, the way the book reads, his first person that he helped (Mr A.) with Baclofen WAS drinking. If he wasn't then Dr. Ameisen made NO attempt to point out that he wasn't. I have not heard of Dr. Ameisen saying anywhere at anytime that there is something wrong with drinking while taking Baclofen. Even Dr. Levin is prescribing high-dose Baclofen to people while they are drinking and to my knowledge he is not telling them that they should quit drinking before taking it. Corkit, please correct me here if I am wrong.
For that matter, I have not heard any doctor come out and say that people should not be drinking while dosing up on Baclofen. Obviously, there are many in the medical profession that are not on board with taking Baclofen for alcoholism. If there was something wrong with taking Baclofen while drinking then that would give any person who was against Baclofen a great way to quickly squash it as a potential help to alcoholics. Yet I have heard no one jumping up and down saying that Baclofen was dangerous or ineffective for people while drinking.
It is true that the baclofen drug information sheets and websites suggest not using alcohol with Baclofen, here are some of them:
"The central nervous system depressant effects of baclofen may be additive to those of alcohol and other CNS depressants." from rxlist.com
"Avoid drinking alcohol. It can increase some of the side effects of baclofen." from drugs.com
"Use of baclofen with other drugs that also depress the function of nerves may lead to additional reduction in brain function." This one from medicinenet.com does not mention alcohol specifically.
These are basically saying to me that if baclofen makes you sleepy then when you drink you are liable to be more sleepy. If baclofen makes you dizzy then you are more likely to be dizzier when you drink. This makes sense. What I think has us most concerned is whether or not we are more likely to stop breathing if we drink while taking baclofen. My own APRN (Advanced Practice Registered Nurse - counselor who can prescribe drugs) was not the least bit concerned about prescribing baclofen for me up to 80 mg (she can't prescribe more). When I later told her I was dosing up using online meds she SUPPORTED me and raised no qualms about me drinking while doing that. Even the media that has started talking to and about Dr. Ameisen is touting this as a very old and safe drug and no issues about problems with taking baclofen and alcohol are being mentioned.
Based on all this, I would say that there is no direct danger from drinking and taking baclofen in the ranges we are doing. Now if someone wanted to off themselves and drank a ton of alcohol followed by taking hundreds of mgs of baclofen at once then maybe there would be a problem but I am not seeing any red flags being raised as baclofen is starting to become a phenomena in treating alcoholism.
Now, as for drinking causing more side effects and or making the switch harder to obtain, who knows? I have seen several references to that on this forum here and there and I hope that the ones who believe that will please tell why they do? I have not seen any studies or even anecdotal information to support this but I would love to hear more about it.
That information is probably very hard to come by without some scientific studies or a lot of data points that include other potential variants like weight, sex, drinking history, age, etc. If you had a lot of data points with all that info plus drinking/not drinking for each data point you could use some statistics to weed out the most potent influences on final switch dose.
As for side effects, certainly while you are under the influence you may be more sleepy, dizzy, etc, but does it make your general side effects worse while you are not intoxicated? I don't know. All I can add to this is that I did manage 5 days in a row AF when I was somewhere in 150-200mgs and I can not say my side effects changed during that time, but then again, 5 days probably is not statistically significant.
I would personally recommend someone who is drinking to go for the switch. I think several others here have also reached the switch while drinking (??). If I had waited until I stopped drinking then there is no telling when I would have been able to go for it. Since I now have NO cravings and am EASILY and HAPPILY AF, I have no regrets about possibly having a few extra side effects along the way or a possibly higher switch than if I had done it AF. The point is mute and I would do it again in a heartbeat, but that is me and I am not a doctor.
I am curious what others think about this topic and why it is believed that if you drink the side effects will be worse and the switch will be higher?
Kelly
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