It seems routine, you get sick and go to the doctor. The doctor prescribes you something and you're supposed to get better. Regardless of what you think about drug companies, nearly all doctors are on your side, not the drug companies. No one goes into medicine to get rich, which is why some doctors will admit which drugs they don't like prescribing and would never take as a patient.
This post is not to be considered medical advice. Please consult your doctor. Remember, you're free to raise any reasonable concerns about side effects of a drug being prescribed.
Amphotericin B
It’s one of the most potent anti-fungal drugs that we have.
Amphotericin B is well known for its severe and potentially lethal side effects. Very often, it causes a serious reaction soon after infusion (within 1 to 3 hours), consisting of high fever, shaking chills, hypotension, anorexia, nausea, vomiting, headache, dyspnea and tachypnea, drowsiness, and generalized weakness. The violent chills and fevers have been nicknamed "shake and bake"
It’s also toxic for the kidneys, liver, and bone marrow.
"Amphoterrible" is what most people call it in my ER. Doctors and nurses alike.
We never use it, unsurprisingly.
"We gave this when I was working inpatient oncology. We hated giving Ampho-B because the side effects. You have to premedicate patients for that stuff."
Olanzapine
As a psychiatrist, Olanzapine. It works, but at a cost of diabetes, hypercholesterolemia and huge weight gain.
Olanzapine, like many of the anti-psychotics is an extremely powerful drug that for the right person can be extremely beneficial. Not everyone gets the side effects and many can take Olanzapine without major problems. My problems with Olanzapine are a) overuse - putting on a bit of weight if you have life crippling psychosis is one thing, less so when the target problem is distress or a bit of insomnia b) since olanzapine was released, other meds have come on to the market that are genuinely lower in life limiting side effects. Olanzapine seems to me to prescribed too frequently compared to other equally powerful medications that don't have quite so many problems.
If I was ever diagnosed with Schizophrenia or Bipolar I would hope to be prescribed Lurasidone/ Aripiprazole/ Asenapine/ possibly even Haloperidol before Olanzapine.
Lyrica
Neurology. I'd never take Lyrica. My dad was suicidal while taking it. He stopped taking it and he stopped feeling suicidal. Not a lot of physicians know about this side effect.
(Physician) I was scrolling through the comments looking for this answer. This was my "knee jerk" answer when reading this question. I would never want to take lyrica. The side effects are just ridiculous. And then To think about the generics , I've been seeing even worse from some of those.
And remember this:
Er doc here. I can’t think of a single drug in any specialty I wouldn’t take given the right circumstances. And we see them all in ER, from the weirdest drugs to the most common. There are times I go ‘why is this person possibly on this’ but that’s more mis-prescribing. Everything comes down to risk benefit. If I started taking a Blood thinner today it would be a bad idea because my risk of bleeding is way higher than a thrombotic event. At 65 and with afib? Gimme gimme!
