Roberts Facing Medical Option on 2nd Seizure (2007)

NYT ^ | August 1, 2007 | DENISE GRADY and LAWRENCE K. ALTMAN

[Nachum]

Despite his quick recovery from the seizure he suffered on Monday, Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. faces a complex diagnosis and a difficult decision.

Because the seizure was his second — he had a similar one in 1993 — he meets the criteria for epilepsy, and he and his doctors will have to decide whether he should take medication to prevent further seizures, said neurologists not involved in his care. (Neither the chief justice nor his doctors would comment yesterday.)

The decision will involve weighing the risk of more seizures against the risk of side effects from the drugs. Major seizures can be a frightening and traumatic experience for patients and family members. Patients are advised to avoid heights and not to swim alone, and many states bar them from driving until they can provide evidence that the disease is under control.

[EBH]

Sorry Dr., but I will dissent with your opinion.

Those drugs are tough on cognitive functions. The fact your patient doesn’t report the problems is anecdotal. Ask their spouse, friends, or employer...

[chessplayer]

He said he spent several months in the hospital ~ on dilantin ~ then a predecessor to depakote (does same stuff but pretty rough on your system)

Traffic is a really tough environment for a seizure.

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I hope he’s ok, now. Thats what scares me the most,,,having one while crossing a street or having one in the shower. The last one I had I had walked to the grocery store and had it there. It could very well have been while crossing the street on the way to the store. Busy intersection and I could have been hit by a car or truck and been killed.

[tanknetter]

Savage is blathering that his meds affected him.

It may have affected him, but no Justice (even the Chief) operates in a vacuum. He has top-notch Clerks and there are three strong Conservative and one leaning-Conservative Justice ... the idea that they wouldn't have been able to effect the outcome of his decision-making process is ludicrous.

[CaspersGh0sts]

“Those drugs are tough on cognitive functions. The fact your patient doesn’t report the problems is anecdotal. Ask their spouse, friends, or employer...”

They can affect cognitive function, but on objective measures of cognitive functioning, including neuropsychiatric testing, the results haven’t been that impressive, especially with newer medications. For instance, neuropsychiatric testing results have shown improved neurocognitive functioning with lamotrigine or oxcarbazepoine but worsened function with older drugs such as topiramate. This is due to the differences in their actions.

I see a far greater decline in cognitive functioning in those with untreated epilepsy.

Even if you could say that Roberts might have had mild congitive slowing with an AED, attributing his decision to inattentiveness wouldn’t seem relevant.

I’d be far more likely to attribute it to a case of the “too clevers.”

[To-Whose-Benefit?]

Then I suggest you go through just the Alphabetical listings of all the different, discrete AERs Medwatch gathered between 2004-2006

http://bonkersinstitute.org/depakoteffex.html
acute psychosis

http://bonkersinstitute.org/neurontineffex.html
acute psychosis

Use your browser’s find function and have a ball. There’s all Manner of noxious treats in store with that Rat S**t that you “Prescribe Routinely”

And Routinely is right. It’s All become “Routine” with over 40% of Doctors too lazy, crooked or stupid to even read the best bought & paid for FDA labels the makers can buy on drugs they “Prescribe Routinely”.
http://www.medpagetoday.com/ProductAlert/Prescriptions/15639

While I haven’t seen Justice Roberts actual written decision yet, the substantive eloquence of it so far is as eloquent as what drops out of the south end of a north bound horse.

You also order neuropsychiatric testing on your patients?

That Would explain how you can describe Roberts opinion as ‘Eloquent”.

[One Name]

Seizures are likely demonic in nature.

It’s right there in the New Testament.

[spokeshave]

Is he taking Statins for Cholesterol.?

FDA adds diabetes, memory loss warnings to statins Tue, Feb 28 2012

By Bill Berkrot and Ransdell Pierson

(Reuters) - Health regulators are adding warnings to the labels of widely used cholesterol lowering drugs, such as Lipitor, to say they may raise levels of blood sugar and could cause memory loss.

The Food and Drug Administration announced on Tuesday the changes to the safety information on the labels of statins such as Pfizer Inc's Lipitor, AstraZeneca's Crestor and Merck & Co's Zocor that are taken by tens of millions of people.

In addition, the FDA said labels for statin drugs now will contain information about patients experiencing memory loss and confusion,

[freekitty]

Thank you.

[little jeremiah]

Check out jimbo’s comment above.

[azishot]

I did. Thanks, lj. I really don’t want to think the chicag0 thugs would use his kids but we all know they’ll do anything possible to anyone to get the results they want...the destruction of the country. He slept with the dogs and we wonder why he has fleas?

[arthurus]

After about a year of antiseizure drugs he will not be able to follow a complicated legal argument or reasoning. He will get worse so long as he is taking the drugs. They affect one’s visual perception and ability to remember words among other effects. One gets to feeling that one is retarded. One’s decision making ability declines to the point that one cannot make a decision. It is a bit like induced Alzheimer’s. You can come back out of it if you quit the drugs but it is gradual and not fast.

[arthurus]

I was in a head-on on the highway on my motorcycle in 72. GM seizures in 73. I was put on Dilantin and Tegretol. I was part of a study of Tranxene which was rejected for seizure control except it "worked" for me. Over the next 10 years or so I got progressively less able to function mentally. I got to where I could not make a decision. I just drifted into things. I could not hold a job. In 84 I went on a 2 week commercial fishing trip that lasted 6 weeks and I ran out of meds. I did not have a seizure until my first night home in bed. Without the meds I got a glimmer of thought and realized i had to decide whether to continue the drugs and slowly disappear in the fog or get off the meds and have the seizures. I managed to decide to taper off. Bad decision. I should have just quit. I tapered for a year with my wife controlling the taper. I finally got enough mental acuity back to be able to stop altogether. By 88 I was experiencing elation whenever I could see how a mechanism works or how to fix something, how things go together. By 95 or so I was able to argue politics again. I still had to read a text several times before I could remember what I read. I had one more seizure a month after that night after the fishing trip. The seizures themselves cause some of the same effects as the medicine.

Some traumatically induced epilepsy can heal slowly but once one is medicated for seizures a doctor will not allow one off the meds because if then one has an accident of any sort one can claim a seizure and sue the doctor.

[arthurus]

I was one. I have no problem with the jokes. That sort of “sensitivity” is silly.

[arthurus]

I was on Dilantin or years. It is not a sledgehammer. It is a progressively greater amount of lead weight continually applied to the mind. It does not level off. It continually gets heavier. I know two other people now who went on Dilantin and Depakote. They are experiencing the same thing. One describes it as being pushed further and further into a smaller and smaller hole. The other doesn’t talk much any more because she is afraid people will know she is stupid.I got to where I was forgetting nouns as in Alzheimer’s.

[arthurus]

I had one on a boat dock a a marina and did not fall into the water. The deputy that was summoned wanted to arrest me for drunk but was overruled by the EMT. Most of mine were apparently outside stimulation and by the slightest sip of alcohol. The alcohol induced events ended after two of them and awareness of that problem.

[arthurus]

I had one on a boat dock at a marina and did not fall into the water. The deputy that was summoned wanted to arrest me for drunk but was overruled by the EMT. Most of mine were apparently induced by outside stimulation and by the slightest sip of alcohol. The alcohol induced events ended after two of them and awareness of that problem.

[chessplayer]

After about a year of antiseizure drugs he will not be able to follow a complicated legal argument or reasoning. He will get worse so long as he is taking the drugs. They affect one’s visual perception and ability to remember words among other effects. One gets to feeling that one is retarded. One’s decision making ability declines to the point that one cannot make a decision. It is a bit like induced Alzheimer’s. You can come back out of it if you quit the drugs but it is gradual and not fast.

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Making it up as you go along, aren’t you?

[arthurus]

Making it up as you go along, aren’t you?
__________________________________________
Never been there or known anyone who has been there or is there, have you?