It is known that troubles never come singly, and very often one health disorder comes on the back of another. For example, major depression is often accompanied by another mental disorder, called generalized anxiety disorder or simply anxiety.
Treating patients, who suffer simultaneously from more than one disorder, may transform into the real challenge for both parties of the treatment process: doctors should do their best to find the combination of medications, which would be equally effective and safe in relieving all the apparent symptoms, and patients should be extremely careful not to mess up with a number of different pills, they have to swallow daily.
However, in case with depression and anxiety there is another way of treatment strategy; and it is called Lexapro.
Lexapro belongs to the class of antidepressants, known as selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs). Discussing what these medications are and how they work lays beyond of the scope of this article, so we will just mention that for the time being SSRIs are considered to be the most potent solution for many mental disorders, including depression, anxiety, bipolar disorders, and phobias.
Lexapro with the active ingredient escitalopram oxalate is the development of the Forest Pharmaceuticals Inc. Originating from Celexa, which was used as the prototype, Lexapro is now said to be the fastest growing SSRI in the United States. One of the reasons for such popularity is, definitely, its proven effectiveness in simultaneous treating of two health disorders – depression and anxiety.
Lexapro works similarly to other SSRIs, mainly by fixing the imbalances of the serotonin hormone in the brains. On the other hand, this medication shows improved level of safety due to its unique technology of isomer isolation.
As the result, one daily dose of 10-20 mg of Lexapro can relieve depression and anxiety symptoms as quickly as in one or two weeks; however, it is said that the maximum effectiveness can be achieved in 6-8 weeks after the initiation of Lexapro therapy.
What is also worth mentioning is that Lexapro demonstrates the same effectiveness as other SSRI antidepressants, but in significantly lesser doses (for example, 10-20 mg daily dose of Lexapro is as effective as 225 mg daily dose of Effexor or 20-50 mg daily dose of Paxil). What does this mean for a patient? First of all, it means lower rates of side effects.
The most common adverse reactions of Lexapro are nausea, insomnia, problems with ejaculation and libido, somnolence, fatigue, and increased sweating. However, the clinical studies showed that the amount of people, who decided to stop taking Lexapro because of side effects, was just the same as the amount of people on sugar pills, who also decided to discontinue treatment because of side effects.
Finally, it is interesting to note that Lexapro shows positive results not only during clinical trials – according to the patients’ reviews on www.drugs.com, this medication was granted 7.5 points of 10 possible for its effectiveness in depression treatment and 6.8 points – in anxiety treatment.
Nick
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