Adderall Maker to Patients: Don't Take Adderall
The company that makes gazillions off its Adderall patent has a message to patients: stop taking Adderall.
But Shire Pharmaceuticals Group PLC's desire has nothing to do with health concerns chronicled in today's feature, "Who's Your Addy?" It revolves around money. The Basingstoke, England, company's patent expires in 2009, at which time the formula will become available as a less-costly generic drug and Shire's Adderall fortunes will plummet. So Shire in February 2007 paid $2.6 billion to acquire New River Pharmaceuticals and the rights to its ADHD drug, lisdexamfetamine, which now sells under the brand name Vyvanse.
Ty Pennington, the host of ABC's Extreme Makeover: Home Edition, is currently touring the country promoting Vyvanse on Shire's dime. An admitted ADHD sufferer, Pennington says his focus has improved since switching to the drug in May. "I don't know about everybody else but it works for me," he told the Atlanta-Journal Constitution.
Shire sales reps have descended on doctor offices to minimize Adderall and push Vyvanse with free 30-day samples for distribution to ADHD patients. Physicians are told Vyvanse has been specially formulated to prevent substance abuse and provide longer lasting effects for ADHD sufferers without adverse Adderall side effects such as teeth grinding, sleeplessness and dramatic weight loss.
But Myomancy.com, a website that monitors ADHD, dyslexia and autism treatments, claims that 10 percent of users taking Vyvanse in company trials stopped due to side effects, much higher than the 2.4 percent of participants who quit during similar Adderall trials.
Some who shared their free trial experiences on the CafePharma.com online forum last year hailed Vyvanse for doing just what Shire promised. One man even called it "hands down the best" ADHD medication he's been on. Plenty of others described Vyvanse nightmares, however.
The mother of a 9-year-old says her boy collapsed, experienced heavy legs and could not move after taking his first, normal dosage of Vyvanse. Another mother says her child heard voices and lashed out violently. A man who switched to Vyvanse at his doctor's urging developed a habit of pulling hair strands out of his head, one at a time. A bipolar young woman says she "kept seeing shit flying around my room." Dizziness, depression, dehydration, sleeplessness, loss of appetite, uncontrollable facial tics, extreme muscle spasms uncontrolled crying and chronic bowel trouble were also reported by disappointed users.
Drug abusers joining the forum discussion countered Shire's claims that one cannot get high off Vyvanse. Taking large doses in one sitting does not get you high, they agree. The trick is to maintain a normal daily dose prescribed to treat ADHD but hours later take more medication.
A 20-year-old followed this ritual with 70mg pills and "a bong rip." He issued this warning: "DO NOT consume cocaine while on this drug. That will hurt for awhile."
Hours after his daily dose for ADHD, an 18-year-old crushed three more 50mg pills and snorted them. "The effects are highly comparable to that of crack, meth and shrooms," he said. "I caution parents to watch their children's prescription."
He exhausted his free 30-day supply in four days.
Vyvanse is supposed to last longer then Adderall. We are considering giving this medication a try . No where in your article is that given as a reason. I would love to save my son a visit daily to the school nurse's office because his Adderall wears off before the end of the school day. I'm not worried about my 9 year old using this drug to get high. Nor do I think every Phar. company is coming out with a drug because the patent is expiring on the old one. This one is suppose to last longer. I'm confident that is why my son's Psch suggested it. I do believe she has our best interests at heart.
Posted On: Friday, Aug. 29 2008 @ 7:59PMAs a person who takes adderall and vyvance for fun, i would have to say both drugs are easy to lead to abuse. Vyvance is infact even more sought after considering its long effect times. Instead of taking amphetamines or amphetamine derivatives, smoke marijuana instead. STIMULANTS ARE BAD.
Posted On: Friday, Aug. 29 2008 @ 8:12PMKathy - Have you looked at Adderall XR? I was on regular Aderall and got tired of forgetting to take it and the rollercoaster effect that I was having. Doctors switched me from 40 Mg of Adderall to 20 Mg of Aderall XR and things are MUCH better then they had been.
Posted On: Saturday, Aug. 30 2008 @ 9:28AMThanks for your comments Anon. Yes, we do give my son the XR. He also takes 20. But, it wears off an hour before school gets out and he is unable to do H.W. unless he takes something else.
Posted On: Saturday, Aug. 30 2008 @ 5:36PMI took adderall when I was younger and it totally fucked up my brain. It made it so I couldn't socialize with people.. still can't that well today. It made it so I couldn't talk or think of what to say with people, depression, gave me really low self-esteem.. and I gained weight on it.
If you're giving this stuff to your kids.. I just want to say.. think again. This is a serious drug... you may not notice or think you have control of it but it will severly alter the way you act....
Posted On: Wednesday, Sep. 3 2008 @ 8:07PMI took adderall when I was younger and it totally fucked up my brain. It made it so I couldn't socialize with people.. still can't that well today. It made it so I couldn't talk or think of what to say with people, depression, gave me really low self-esteem.. and I gained weight on it.
If you're giving this stuff to your kids.. I just want to say.. think again. This is a serious drug... you may not notice or think you have control of it but it will severly alter the way you act....
Posted On: Wednesday, Sep. 3 2008 @ 8:07PMevery medical doctor's financial holdings and backers should be made open to ALL PATIENTS. of course an honest doctor would never withhold this information. you just have to find one first.
call me cynical but i doubt if even a tenth of all doctors would agree to it. the fact is they get promotional stuff ALL the time and not just samples, pens, and notepads, but stock options, vacations, and extravagant gifts. after all this it is impossible to claim an unbiased opinion.
why blindly trust?
Posted On: Thursday, Sep. 4 2008 @ 12:39AM"Hours after his daily dose for ADHD, an 18-year-old crushed three more 50mg pills and snorted them. “The effects are highly comparable to that of crack, meth and shrooms,” he said. “I caution parents to watch their children’s prescription.”"
The effects are similar to crack, meth, and... shrooms? Alright, so you're officially making shit up now. Crack and meth, fine, both stimulants working on dopamine receptors... but shrooms are a tryptamine working on serotonin receptors.
The effects are nothing at all alike, and anyone who suggests that they are is either ignorant or lying. Either way, it does not bode well for your credibility.
Posted On: Thursday, Sep. 4 2008 @ 6:52AMKathy S: If you re-read the last sentence of the fourth paragraph above, you'll find this: Physicians are told Vyvanse has been specially formulated to prevent substance abuse and provide longer lasting effects for ADHD sufferers without adverse Adderall side effects such as teeth grinding, sleeplessness and dramatic weight loss.
Bill R: Based on what I've heard, PCP can give one the intense, hyper awake feeling of crack coupled with the hallucinations common with 'shrooms, so perhaps what the 18-year-old kid says he experienced is not out of the realm of possibility. The only way to find out, I suppose, is have you take 50mg of Vyvanse in the morning, crush and snort three more 50mg pills that night and then report back to us the effects. But even then, who knows? Last night I had dinner with two sets of parents. One told me how great Adderall was for their child, the other said they had to pull their boy off it because, while his grades improved, it made him feel depressed and worthless. And they still had to fight with the family doctor to get him to stop prescribing it.
Posted On: Monday, Sep. 8 2008 @ 11:21AMI have a six year old. I'm a calm person, but when i'm fiesty I may be angry for a reason. of Jan. 08 the pressure of adderall came to me. i think a stimulant, drug for her if not my intentions of bringing her up with her peers to give her problems. adhd may be a short term or long term situation depends on your strutrure of your devoping brain. When your the parent as I . do not think its the pill, adhd that affects the child/person/individual. its the attention we want. we need to solve it with eniphatize talking with outspoken words to be heard this is heartbreaking for children to adminster any med. it could affect you forever, just think about it.
Posted On: Tuesday, Sep. 9 2008 @ 9:15AMAdderall was working great for our teen. Then the Dr., hearing that Vyvance is not abusable and his friends won't steal it, switched him to Vyvanse. Vyvanse did not work at all!!! (In hindsight I'm thinking, "If it ain't broke, don't fix it). He's back on Adderall again which turns him from Mr. Hyde back into Dr. Jeckel.
Posted On: Wednesday, Sep. 10 2008 @ 7:41PMEmma: Please share your comments on the CafePharma site, the link is in the post above. As a parent, I wish I'd been exposed to comments like these because they would have helped in the decision to medicate my kids.
Posted On: Thursday, Sep. 11 2008 @ 7:54AMStimulants like Ritalin and Adderall can be extremely beneficial (yay for Big Pharma), but yes they can be dangerous too.
Hitler, Goebells, Goering, and many of the Soviets and Imperial Japanese abused or were outright addicted to amphetamines. Indeed stimulants in particular (in addition to opiates and alcohol) probably contributed to a lot of World War 2 era atrocities.
None of this is to say they should not be used, but they SHOULD be used with caution and under the supervision of a doctor whose name is not Theodore Morrell.
Posted On: Tuesday, Oct. 7 2008 @ 6:08PMI'm amazed at the comments of the use of adderall or any ADHD drug. We have 2 boys 13 & 11. One is on adderall the other is on Concerta. We have gone to great lengths not to medicate our 2 youngest boys. We have 5 children. The reason for medication is to give my boys the same opportunity to learn as any other kid. If your child had any other disease that required medication you would give it to them. This is no different. My friend is a Pharacist and she did her thesis on the ADHD brain and there is a big difference in how the brain responds. On the meds it responds correctly. If you are going to have a child with any type of problems wouldn't you learn everything you can about it and find out for yourself. Just like everything else in life there is abuse and yes if you choose to abuse these drugs you can but as for me and my family we have done alot of research, and I'm happy to say that we like the self esteem that comes from being able to do your school work and do it well. If your child is correctly diagnosed you will understand what I mean. Thank you to those people who develope medications for the right reasons.
Posted On: Tuesday, Oct. 28 2008 @ 8:19PMHey, I am 20 years old and I have been taking adderall since I was 15. I began taking 10 mg in high school, and it completely changed my grades. Before I began taking adderall, I had NO concentration, I talked all the time, did not feel motivated in school, and sometimes slept in class. After adderall, it changed everything, I suddenly WANTED to do my work, and started getting all A's, and B's. When I started college I was on 15 mg of adderall, and it began to wear off fast, and I couldnt finish my studies so I went to the doctor and she told me about vyvance, and how it lasts 6-8 hours and adderall lasts 12 hours, but that vyvance was newer and alot of people have been satisfied with the effects so I tried it. I was put on 50mg of vyvance and immediately I did not like it. When I would take the vyvance in the morning about an hour later it would kick in, and the side effects were way more noticable than my adderall, but it lasted less time. If I would take my vyvance in the morning around 8 am it would wear off around 2pm and just to finish my hw I felt like i needed to take another pill, and I never had that problem with my adderall. I told my doctor and she put me back on adderall and I have been very satisfied. Trust me it works if you take the drug for the right reasons and are put on the correct dosage for your body.
Posted On: Monday, Feb. 9 2009 @ 5:24AMi take vyvance on a regular basis. And its definately not perscribed to me. To be honest, i take it for the high. Ive read throughout the comments that some parents have been told it cant be abused, theyre blue and orange capsuls. Your child can take up to...Well ive taken up to five at one time, they can and will get you high. They can be abused and are even sold. They go for two dollars a pill usually. So, dont put that past your kid just because you doctor says they cant be abused. A few years back, im pretty sure people also thought cold medicines would get you high, wrong there too.
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