I was taken off Fentanyl because the hot weather is causing the patch to burn my skin. Now they are giving me Exalgo 16mg 2xday. Does anyone have any experience with this drug? I am only on my second day but so far it is not coming close to covering my pain and also Im getting really bad headaches. I am going to wait until Monday to see if anything changes before I call the doctor. Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Exalgo is hydromorphone, the same as dilaudid basically. It has the normal laundry list of side effects like all the narcotics do. It's nowhere near as strong as Fentanyl, which would explain the pain coverage issue....not sure what your doc was thinking. He took you off a LA med and put you on a SA med.
To the OP...most Dr.s when switching to a new medication...will always start with the lowest dosage possible until they know what side effects or any interactions you may have...so it takes being patient a bit as he can tirate up the dosage as needed..
He's already prescribing the 16mg every 12 hours instead of every 24...so he has essentially doubled the dosage right from the start...
Obviously if you are having any life threatening reactions like hives..swelling...throat closing..inability to breath..etc...call 911.....
Any new medicine will have side effects that most go away within a few weeks....headaches are pretty common with a new narcotic...just like some nausea or fatigue...
My PM always tells his patients to give a new medicine a month (minus any major issues as I described to call for help)....
As well as give it a few weeks to decide if you need to up the dosage or not....As it also takes time for our body to get used to a new pain medicine to do it's job...
And keep in mind...the medicine is never meant to take away all our pain...we still have to always be doing things in addition to this to help...Like exercise, yoga/stretching, aqua therapy, massage, acupuncture, CBT, eating healthy, not smoking, a muscle relaxer if needed....sleep med if needed...an antidepressant....nerve pain medicine...etc..
I know for myself...I try to only take the absolute minimum dosage of my medicine since I've been at this for 10 years..and many more to come so I want to keep my tolerance very low...I've only had to raise my dosage once in two years...I live with a 5-7 on the pain scale..
You can certainly call and talk to your Dr. and let him know about your headache and pain relief and see what he has to say as we can only speculate and offer what works for us...other pain patients...
I hope that since you can't use the patch...that maybe this or something else will be able to help you..
Last edited by Ilovemycutedog; 06-03-2011 at 11:14 AM.
The Following User Says Thank You to Ilovemycutedog For This Useful Post: manicpuzzleman (06-03-2011)
I would call the dr. Monday and request a dosage increase. you've been on strong enough meds, if this one was going to help, you'd know by now. Different meds don't breakdown the same across the board as far as mg's are concerned, so it's a bit tricky when you first start a new one getting the conversion right. But, that doesn't mean you need to give up on the med altogether, just call your doc and get the dosage upped and see if that works first. Good luck with it.
Take care and let us know how your doing.
kat
Last edited by Administrator; 06-03-2011 at 11:03 PM.
Exalgo is considered a long acting medication. Most reports on Exalgo are negative due to poor bioavailability and an overly optimistic claim of 24 hour coverage.
As you/we know, big pharma just keeps repackaging the same old 5 or 6 core Narcotics into supposedly NEW drugs.
Exalgo is just Hydromorphone with a 24-hour delivery system.
Iso, omg, how are you? where have you been hiding? You okay? I actually had put that in my post, but if you notice it was edited by the admin and they took it out. So thanks for mentioning it, but yeah I had figured my mistake. I thought it came in a SA form also, but it doesn't.
It's amazing how right when they're taking Dilauded off the market now we have Exalgo! *LOL* it even sounds kind of tropical doesn't it!
I hope you are doing well, hanging in there, hugs to you!
I'm okay, I'm just in that dissolutioned state of 'Wow, none of this crap really works'. I guess it all comes down to going it alone - None of the mind meds have straightened out my escalating crazy, and pain meds only go so far before we become tolerant or just sick of taking them....
So, any new wonder meds out there now? Has that Levorphanol ER hit the market yet?
I haven't seen it or heard of anyone using it.....the Exalgo was the newest one I've seen this week and when I heard the name I really thought it was going to be some great new wonder med.....when i found out it was just Dilauded i think I laughed for like 20 minutes, what a crock!
I'm still on the same ole same ole, morphine & percocet, works for me, so why change...I'm a creature of habit!
Sorry that things aren't working for you, but good to see you.
