How many of you have experienced that dreaded rash? I just started this medication a few days ago and I'm super super paranoid. I have very fair sensitive skin that sometimes develops rashes for no reason. My Pdoc told me to just watch closely and discontinue the medication if it appears. Is it super common? I'm desperate for this medication to work, so I'm taking the risk.

[reb569]

My daughter got the rash after being put on it while IP. The DR was agressive with the dose. She ended up on Tegratol instead. It's actually pretty rare.

What dose did they start you at?

[Guiness187055]

The rash is actually pretty rare. Just make sure you are going up in dose slowly and it probably will not be an issue.

Originally Posted by reb569

My daughter got the rash after being put on it while IP. The DR was agressive with the dose. She ended up on Tegratol instead. It's actually pretty rare.

What dose did they start you at?

They started me on the lowest dose-- I think it's 20 or 25 mg? Can't remember exactly, don't have the bottle in front of me. They want me to titrate up slowly by one tablet every week.

Do you know how fast it's supposed to work? I'm so desperate for relief from my racing thoughts, crying, and screaming at everyone.

I used to take lamictal and never got the rash. I think it's quite rare.

[Ellahmae]

Originally Posted by may_sparkle

They started me on the lowest dose-- I think it's 20 or 25 mg? Can't remember exactly, don't have the bottle in front of me. They want me to titrate up slowly by one tablet every week.

Do you know how fast it's supposed to work? I'm so desperate for relief from my racing thoughts, crying, and screaming at everyone.

I'm glad that she started you out low and is tritrating you properly. It took about 4 days for me to start having a little relief and each time I increased it helped more and more until I got to my steady state dosage. Keep us updated on how it's working for you.

[reb569]

they started my daughter at 50 mg and had pushed her up to 150 in less than a week. starting at 25 and increasing slowly sounds like how its supposed to be done.

Statistically, the incidence of SJS with lamictal is less than 1/10 of 1%. It was originally a bit higher when lamictal was first introduced because initially they weren't titrating is as slowly. It also was shown to be a bigger problem with lamictal is used with valproic acid. Since those changes have been made, the incidence had become rather rare.

[Ellahmae]

Originally Posted by reb569

they started my daughter at 50 mg and had pushed her up to 150 in less than a week. starting at 25 and increasing slowly sounds like how its supposed to be done.

Oh, wow! It took my almost 2 months to just get to 100! Now a year later I'm finally where it makes a difference for me.

[Guiness187055]

I started to feel it at 100mg did not start helping until 200mg which I am still on It took me two months to get to the dose that I am on now.

[reb569]

Originally Posted by Ellahmae

Oh, wow! It took my almost 2 months to just get to 100! Now a year later I'm finally where it makes a difference for me.

Yeah I was pretty upset when I found out what they did. I had researched it and suspected they were being too aggressive but next thing I knew she had the rash and was being pulled off of it. She didn't get the full-blown SJS. I mentioned it to her out patient pdoc and he said they were way too aggressive with the dosage. She's doing ok on the Tegratol though.