Two Anti-Depressants For Nerve Pain: How Did They Do?

Today's short post from alert.psychnews.org (see link below) reports that a new study has shown both Duloxetine (Cymbalta and others) and Venlafaxine ( ‎Effexor, Trevilor, Lanvexin, others) to be reasonably effective treatments for nerve pain. Well reasonable in the sense that they performed better than other pills...when compared to placebos. These two serotonin-norepinephrine reuptake inhibitors (anti-depressants) are already widely prescribed for neuropathic pain but as we know, what works for one patient, doesn't necessarily work for others, which leads to patient frustration and difficulties for researchers and studies to come to definitive conclusions. The article also states that pregabalin is FDA approved for neuropathic pain - it's not! The FDA goes as far as to demand that warnings about the side effects be placed on boxes. It's a minefield for patients wondering whether what their doctor has prescribed is a)going to work and b) going to be safe. It is safe to say that almost all drugs prescribed to limit neuropathic pain can have side effects and therefore it's vitally important that you have a serious discussion with your doctor before embarking on a course of drugs. Together you need to weigh up the benefits and risks and even then there's no guarantee that your symptoms will diminish. However, maybe that shouldn't stop you trying - anything is better than that relentless pain...right! But your doctor should monitor your progress on any given drug, with great care and if necessary change the treatment.
 

Duloxetine, Venlafaxine May Be Most Effective at Reducing Diabetic Nerve Pain
Posted by Psychiatric News Monday, March 27, 2017

The serotonin-norepinephrine reuptake inhibitors duloxetine and venlafaxine appear to have the best evidence for being effective at reducing nerve pain in people with diabetes, according to a meta-analysis published in Neurology. Duloxetine is FDA-approved for treating pain in diabetic neuropathy, though venlafaxine is not.

The researchers pooled together data from 106 clinical studies published between 2011 and 2015 examining the effectiveness of pharmacologic approaches to improving pain in patients with diabetic peripheral neuropathy. The analysis compared outcomes in patients taking 21 different medications, though the authors were unable to draw conclusions for any head-to-head drug comparisons due to insufficient evidence.

The researchers found moderate evidence to suggest that duloxetine and venlafaxine were more effective at reducing neuropathy-related pain than placebo. Tricyclic antidepressants, botulinum toxin, the opioids tramadol and tapentadol, and the anticonvulsants pregabalin and oxcarbazepine were also found to be more effective than placebo, but the evidence base for these medications was weak.

In contrast, the anticonvulsant gabapentin, mood stabilizer valproate, and capsaicin cream were all found to be no more effective than placebo; these findings run contrary to guidelines for treating diabetic peripheral neuropathy published by the American Academy of Neurology in 2011, which listed all three agents as probably effective.

“Our findings generally support the effectiveness of the three drugs approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for the treatment of pain in diabetic peripheral neuropathy: duloxetine, pregabalin, and tapentadol,” wrote Julie Waldfogel, Pharm.D., of the Johns Hopkins Hospital and her colleagues. “Additional studies evaluating longer term outcomes are needed to better inform clinical decision-making, patient choice, and clinical practice guidelines.”

http://alert.psychnews.org/2017/03/duloxetine-venlafaxine-may-be-most.html