Joined: 24 Jul 2007 Posts: 3 Location: Rochester, NY
Sarafem Or Zoloft to Treat Pmdd Posted: 07-24-07 18:48pm
My primary care doctor recently suggested
that I start taking Prozac (fluoxetine)
for my depression related to menstrual
cycle. But I am a little bit hesitant to
start taking it because of the list of
side effects. In your experience with
patients, does Sarafem tend to work better
than Zoloft to relieve symptoms of
depression related to PMDD? Also, how is
Sarafem different than regular Prozac? Is
it a lower dose of Prozac? I know that
they are both SSRI's, but do any of them
work better (with less side effects) for
treating PMDD?
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Georgia59
Moderator
Joined: 11 Apr 2007 Posts: 5546 Location: Along the Mississippi, USA
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Posted: 07-25-07 11:32am
I'm not a doc but I do know a bit about
this issue... Anti depressants are a lot
like birth control pills in that they are
all a little bit different, and different
pills effect everyone differently.
Sometimes you might need to try a few
before you find the right one for you, and
none of them are sure bets that you will
or won't have side effects.
From what I can tell Sarafem and Prozac
are really similar. They are both SSRI's-
the same active ingredient. I'm not sure
if they are really different or if they
are just marketed differently, Sarafem for
PMDD and Zoloft for depression, but they
can both be used to treat it. Also,
Sarafem is usually prescribed differently,
sometimes patients are instructed only to
take it during the last week or two of
their cycle. Sometimes they take it the
whole month.
My feelings are, if your doc thought it
was the right thing to prescribe, trust
her and try it out. If you try it for a
few weeks and have bad side effects, talk
to her about what would be good to switch
to. You may have the same problems with
Sarafem, or it might be completely
different. You'd never know until you
tried it.
