? re: xanax for Cam

I take 1 mg of xanax at about 11:30 each night so I can sleep. I just got a refill (generic) and I seem to be groggy in the morning now. Could this refill be slightly different and could it be staying in my system longer? How long does it stay in your system anyway? Thanks for all your help!

Here ... er, never mind ....
Kitty - There could be several reasons for the "hangover effect" occurring with the generic (alprazolam) and not with the name brand (eg. Xanax™).

What is most likely happening is a difference in dissolution rates of the two tablets. Upjohn™ markets Xanax™ for anxiety disorders (agoraphobia, panic attacks [both acute and prophylactic], GAD, social phobia, etc.) their pharmaceutical engineers designed the tablet to dissolve rapidly. Rapid dissolving in the stomach (not the bottle, hand, mouth, or throat) involves having the drug molecules totally surrounded by stomach fluid, (hydrogen and chloride ions, chyme and water mainly), with no filler, binders, nor even other drug molecules trapping or otherwise interfering with the absorption of the Xanax.

So, fast dissolution means the drug works faster, or so T.V. commercials tell us. Ordinarily, devices that introduce medications into the body are available in certain formulation(s) (injections, capsules, tablets, syrups, elixirs, suspensions, transdermal patches, etc) but usually are not available in all formulations. By and large, the major limiting factors for determining a formulation is:

1) Who is going to be using the medication?
- child, invalid, race, elderly, etc.
- other factors - taste, size of dosage, convenience for carrying, single v. multiple medication regimens.

2) How stable is the drug molecule in each of these formulations?
- the more stable form(s) will have longer half-lifes, but a very stable tablet with a 6 year shelf life is still may be no good as a medication; eg. if the person needing it has to swallowing a tablet and cannot (eg. comatose patient, child).
- eg. you won't see Seroquel™ (quetiapine) in an injectible form, as it takes about 6 litres of liquid to make a stable injectible form.

3) How expensive is the formulation to make?
- if it is easier to keep the pill in solution and package it in a gelcap, rather than raising the price of a tablet by $30/ea in developing a way to make the molecule form a stable powder.

Anyway, one way generic companies save money is by using cheaper binders (glues and sugars that bind the tablet, holding the tablet's distinctive shape) and fillers (when you think about it, 2mg is not very heavy, nor is it very large; neither is 250mg. An inert substance is added, such as lactose or corn starch, to give the tablet or capsule some bulk so that it can be easily handled).

The cheap filler used in this incidence could have been responsible. Since quick absorption leads to (at least slightly) faster onset of action. With the brand name Xanax™ using more expensive binders and fillers that have been designed to have all of the ingredients completely dissociate from one another leads to a quick, more pronounced spike in the blood level concentration of the Xanax™, giving that immediate relief from a panic attack. The generic company that is more than likely using a relatively cheap inert filler like lactose. What can happen in using the cheaper filler is that tablet dissolution can be incomplete. You won't get near the spike in alprazolam blood concentrations as was seen with the brand name.

The generic tablet may keep slowly breaking up throughout the night. The brand name drug has been completely absorbed, been metabolized and is getting prepared for excretion; meanwhile the generic brand is just finishing being absorbed.

Thus, in the morning your alprazolam levels are higher from the generic brand, because the name brand was excreted, as well as absorbed, quickly. This is what is causing the hangover effect.

The half-life of alprazolam is approximately 12h to 15h. This is the halfway point in the time that it took from ingestion of the drug until the time that half of the drug in the bloodstream is metabolized



<font color=orange>"Sometimes you may be shown the light in the strangest of places, if you look at it right"
- Robert Hunter</font color=orange>

Thank you Cam. This makes a lot of sense. Your answers are so informative! I just wish drs knew as much as you do before presribing meds.