Smoking-Pill Suicides
 

Hundreds of reports of suicides, psychotic reactions and other serious problems tied to the popular stop-smoking drug Chantix were left out of a crucial government safety review because Pfizer Inc., the drug’s manufacturer, submitted years of data through “improper channels.”

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/43187290...ssing-reports/

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GCers who smoke, I hope you safely quit smoking. :)

I was on chantix twice, a month long each, and other than getting horrid gas (imagine a filled balloon in your small intestine) and some wicked lucid dreams* I didn't suffer any other ill effects. I'm using nicorette now.

*in one dream I was lying in bed sleeping and a masked man walked into my bedroom with knife and stabbed me to death while I slept. I saw it all happen but couldn't move or "wake up" from it. Not cool at all.

That's scary! And why I have a real problem with all these easy fix drugs that these companies are just throwing out there. Sometimes in lif, a pill can't fix it.

@Pika2001, I quit smoking 4 years ago. I recommend the lozenges. If you drink sociall, like I do, they come in handy when you need a quick fix. I still use them but would NEVER smoke again. Not sure if you are using the gum or lozenge, but the gum wasn't good for me as chewing gum isn't appropriate at times.

I use the gum very sparingly, so far it's working fine for me. I will admit that when I'm out with friends who smoke I might smoke a cig but I'm OK with being a once in a while smoker.

Apparently that's not uncommon. I read the comments in the article I posted.

I was never a smoker but I know that these companies are making a ton of money. I hope people read the fine print.

Many anti-depressants interrupt your sleep cycle and cause very vivid dreams. It's pretty common actually. Psychoactive drugs can have lots of effects. The black box warning on anti-depressants for children due to the risk of suicide has significantly decreased the number of prescriptions being written in that age group, but clearly it's not a problem only in children.

2 of my friends took Chantix and they got screw up from the dreams and stuff...they quit taking the stuff...another friend who was on Chantix, wasn't effected that seriously....

they do tell you the side effects in the commercials...

My late mother on law quit in 2000 by using Wellbutrin. I quit in 1997 cold turkey. That Chantix is some scary shit!

Strattera has similar effects. (And apparently it was a 'failed' antidepressant in the US so no surprise).

My dreams on that crap were nothing but loud noises and color and the weirdest most surreal situations that mostly kept me awake. Psychotropic medications of all stripes affect your brain, monitoring them closely is really fracking important, and people who think it's just popping a pill a day and woohoo are usually people who haven't been on them. (Hint, there are no easy fixes to whoever posted that but sometimes they're needed ones.)

Pfizer's a corporate asshole for any hiding of this that was done with Chantix.

I take both Strattera and Zoloft and have had horribly ridiculous dreams for years. Vivid dreams, lucid dreams, just foolishness all around. Now that I'm so used to it it's no big deal, but it scared the bejeezus out of me when I first started taking them. I've got a few friends on Chantix and they have similar dreams, and a couple have a hard time sleeping as a result. If I were going to use something to quit, it wouldn't be Chantix.

I occasionally go weeks without smoking because I'm at my parents' or have respiratory problems and have never experienced more than a moderate headache...quitting caffeine was way more unpleasant. But I'm so psychologically/socially dependent on smoking. Gum/lozenges don't do me a lot of good because it isn't really the nicotine I want, it's the smoking experience. I have a camp job this summer where I obviously won't be able to smoke but also won't be around smokers, so that's going to be my habit-breaker. Coming back to school in the fall and not picking it back up is going to be sooooo hard.

My brief soujourn into psychotropics resulted in WAY more vivid dreams than I cared to have (and they weren't fun vivid either, like sex with George Clooney or something). It also ramped up my sense of smell to the point where I couldn't use anything stronger than very light body spray - no perfume - and smells in general were super strong. I assume that part was similar to what women go through when they're pregnant.

As far as not smoking, I think that like alumiyum said, a lot of what's hard to kick is the experience - the lighting up, holding it, etc etc and not just the nicotine dependency.

Zyban is Wellbutrin.. same exact medication, repackaged after they discovered that it helps block the neuroreceptors that nicotine binds to, fooling people into thinking they are getting nicotine without actually getting any. All anti-depressants carry a risk of suicide for a couple reasons. First off, people take it because they are depressed so they are at higher risk of suicide to begin with. Sometimes, people are too depressed to have the energy to commit suicide. As the anti-depressant begins to work, they sometimes reach a stage where they are still very depressed, but it's lifted enough that they have the energy and motivation to attempt suicide. If you can help them ride that through, they get better enough to NOT want to kill themselves. This is the big disservice in the extremely short lengths of stay for inpatient adult psych patients. 3-5 days is not enough to pull someone up enough to prevent that phenomena.

I've been on Chantix twice and it was great. I had no side effects at all and it was the only method that actually made me forget that I wanted to smoke. It was awesome. I have a co-worker who got really paranoid on it and had to stop taking it. She tends to have some mental health issues anyway so I think it was affecting her differently.

I'm smoking real cigarettes half the time and electronic cigarettes half the time now. I'm going to move to just electronic soon. They are great.. give you the feeling of holding it, the same feeling in the throat when you inhale (which is what I miss most when I quit) and you can get cartridges for them that deliver varying amounts of nicotine or ones that deliver no nicotine at all. They can be used anywhere that smoking isn't allowed because there is no actual smoke. There is a small steam vapor but it is not smoke. Many stores have disposable ones now so some of you may want to try a disposable. A disposable here is $9.99 and is about 3 packs of cigarettes worth of nicotine/puffs before the battery dies out. The non-disposable come with battery chargers and have to be re-charged. The end even lights up. No smell, no ashes, etc. They are great. My biggest issue with the disposable one is that you don't know when you're done smoking. Like, with a real cigarette, it burns away and is gone so you know you're done. Not true with the disposable. My cousin told me that one of the electronic ones has a "done" indicator to let you know you've smoked the equivalent of one cigarette. I'd like to try that one.

Key advice for many things--a pill cant always fix it!

Yeah, I'm stuck on Lybrel thanks to my husband who thought it would prevent my migraines. Big mistake...it doesn't do shit, and I can't get off of it bc I turn into a huge bitch. :D. Anyway, my dreams are so vivid and disturbing. I had a dream that my sister told me she'd been hurting my niece. I've dreamed that friends and family members are dead. I've also dreamed that I'm pregnant and trying to get an abortion. Lots of times, though, I'm going back to college and moving into the sorority dorm. Every morning I wake up with a full memory of a bizarre dream.

Thanks for the e-cig info Dee...I might get myself one for when I get back on campus this fall. That's what I'm worried about most-falling back into the habit. I like the idea of a safe way to do it.