@tension
07-04-06, 01:39 AM
Hello,
I am on Concerta 54mg plus regular Ritalin. The package insert of the brand name (Novartis) Ritalin that I am taking says it should not be administered together with antacids since these would "substantially reduce the effectiveness of Ritalin".
Now here's my question: It has been often stated that the effect of amphetamine-derived drugs, methyphendiate being one of them, would be increased/prolonged by the classic antacid sodium bicarbonate (aka baking soda).
As these two statements apparently seem to contradict each other, I asked my doc about this and got no basically no conclusive answer.
Given one can safely assume the sodium - amphetamine statement to be true, then sodium bicarbonate would be an exception to the antacids recommendation stated by Novartis?
Or, approaching the Novartis "logic" from the opposite angle: in contrary to the frequently read note that having an overly acidic stomach (be it from certain foods or pathologically) is generally known to accelarate the excretion rate (thus lessening the effectiveness) of MPH, would somebody who suffers from chronic heartburn therefore be able to maintain Ritalin's effectiveness by ditching his/her antacid (non sodium) medication?
This seems even more counterintuitive to me.
No matter how I look at it, it all doesnt seem to make much sense.
Apart from expensive medical abstracts, I have basically looked in every possible corner of the web trying to find a detailed explanation of the Novartis advice, only to return empty handed. All pages that do deal with it merely reiterate this one-liner without offering any underlying details that would give this argument some weight.
I hope somebody can explain to me what point I am missing in this, since I am really at loss here struggling with chronic reflux which I fear could potentially render my ADD medication useless.
thanks in advance
I am on Concerta 54mg plus regular Ritalin. The package insert of the brand name (Novartis) Ritalin that I am taking says it should not be administered together with antacids since these would "substantially reduce the effectiveness of Ritalin".
Now here's my question: It has been often stated that the effect of amphetamine-derived drugs, methyphendiate being one of them, would be increased/prolonged by the classic antacid sodium bicarbonate (aka baking soda).
As these two statements apparently seem to contradict each other, I asked my doc about this and got no basically no conclusive answer.
Given one can safely assume the sodium - amphetamine statement to be true, then sodium bicarbonate would be an exception to the antacids recommendation stated by Novartis?
Or, approaching the Novartis "logic" from the opposite angle: in contrary to the frequently read note that having an overly acidic stomach (be it from certain foods or pathologically) is generally known to accelarate the excretion rate (thus lessening the effectiveness) of MPH, would somebody who suffers from chronic heartburn therefore be able to maintain Ritalin's effectiveness by ditching his/her antacid (non sodium) medication?
This seems even more counterintuitive to me.
No matter how I look at it, it all doesnt seem to make much sense.
Apart from expensive medical abstracts, I have basically looked in every possible corner of the web trying to find a detailed explanation of the Novartis advice, only to return empty handed. All pages that do deal with it merely reiterate this one-liner without offering any underlying details that would give this argument some weight.
I hope somebody can explain to me what point I am missing in this, since I am really at loss here struggling with chronic reflux which I fear could potentially render my ADD medication useless.
thanks in advance