Some of the most common ones are decreased appetite and insomnia. Irritability and moodiness. These side effects are associated with all stimulant medications for ADHD.
But Concerta stays in the system longer than shorter-acting drugs. So, side effects like sleep problems and loss of appetite may be more pronounced in a small percentage of kids. Concerta is prescribed in five dosages: 18mg, 27mg, 36mg, 54mg or 72mg. These dosages may seem high compared to other ADHD drugs, some of which start as low as 5mg.
At the right dosage, Concerta should stay in the system for 12 hours. Kids metabolize drugs differently. On average, Concerta helps with attention for about seven to eight hours. Prescribers typically start at the lowest dosage 18mg. Here are answers to common questions parents ask about Concerta. The generic name for Concerta is methylphenidate extended release.
All stimulant medications are controlled substances. Abuse is more common with another class of stimulants: amphetamine-based ADHD medications. Adderall is an example of one. They may also be used by people who have other addictions. There are restrictions in place to reduce the potential for abuse and addiction with stimulants. For instance, prescribers can only write prescriptions for one month at a time. And a few studies show that they lower the overall addiction risk in teens with ADHD.
Read more about ADHD medication misuse. Stimulants tend to delay sleep by 30 to 40 minutes in many kids. This study showed that Ritalin LA was more effective in treating ADHD symptoms in the morning, within the first 4 hours after it was taken, than Concerta was. However, because Ritalin LA wears off after about 6 hours, Concerta may be a better option for some people.
This is because the effects of Concerta last for about 12 hours in your body. However, because the medications release differently in your body, there are differences in their effectiveness after certain amounts of time since they were taken. Concerta and Ritalin LA are both brand-name drugs. There are currently generic forms of both drugs available. Yes, Concerta is a stimulant medication. It works by stimulating your central nervous system CNS , which includes your brain and spinal cord.
Both of these chemicals help your brain to pay attention and focus. You may have withdrawal symptoms if you stop taking Concerta. This is because Concerta affects certain brain chemicals called norepinephrine and dopamine. Once you stop taking Concerta, your brain will have less of these chemicals, which can lead to withdrawal symptoms. Withdrawal symptoms can begin within 24 hours of your last dose of Concerta. This can help to reduce the withdrawal effects that you may have by quickly stopping your higher dose of Concerta.
It possibly can. Concerta affects levels of a brain chemical called dopamine. This feeling is often called euphoria a feeling of extreme happiness.
However, in clinical studies , Concerta caused less euphoria than Ritalin, another drug that also contains methylphenidate. This is because Concerta releases the drug slowly over time, while Ritalin releases all of drug at once. Because of this, your dopamine levels are increased slower than they are with Ritalin. They can discuss this risk with you and review all of your treatment options.
In clinical trials , decreased height and weight were seen in children taking Concerta. After 3 years of treatment with the drug, children were shorter by an average of 2 centimeters about 0. Those taking Concerta also had a lower body weight by an average of 2. You possibly can. Concerta is a stimulant medication that can increase your heart rate and blood pressure. Before starting Concerta, your doctor will make sure that your heart is healthy enough for you to take a stimulant medication.
If you have high blood pressure, heart failure, or a history of heart attack, your doctor may do extra testing to be sure your heart is healthy enough for you to take Concerta. Adults have a higher risk of heart problems while taking stimulants. Adults with certain heart problems should avoid taking stimulant medications. These heart problems include:. Concerta should also be avoided in children with structural heart issues or other serious heart problems.
Sudden death, stroke , and heart attack have occurred in people taking stimulant medications. Concerta may also be used off-label for other conditions.
But it can continue into your adult life. Symptoms of ADHD include:. To be diagnosed with ADHD, your symptoms must cause trouble in multiple settings, such as at home, work, or school. Your symptoms must also be present before the age of 7 years.
However, genetics probably play a role in the development of this condition. The three types of ADHD are described below. Three different clinical trials studied Concerta use in children ages 6 to 12 years. In these studies, children taking Concerta had a significant decrease in inattention and overactivity. This was in comparison to children who were taking a placebo treatment with no active drug. In addition, one study looked at adolescents children ages 13 to 18 years with ADHD.
Adolescents taking Concerta had their ADHD symptoms reduced more than did adolescents taking a placebo. A clinical trial showed that Concerta significantly reduced inattention in adults taking the drug compared with adults taking a placebo.
Concerta is approved for use in children ages 6 years and older with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder ADHD. You may wonder if Concerta is used for other conditions.
Using Concerta for weight loss is not an appropriate use of the drug. Sometimes stimulant medications such as Concerta can make anxiety symptoms even worse. If you have both anxiety and ADHD, Concerta may not be the right medication for you, because it can make your anxiety even worse. With bipolar disorder, people can have extreme changes in their mood and energy levels. Concerta is not an appropriate treatment for people with ADHD who also have bipolar disorder. Taking Concerta can make your bipolar disorder worse.
If you have bipolar disorder and ADHD, talk with your doctor about your treatment options. With this condition, you may feel unusually tired and fall asleep suddenly. However, Concerta is not approved to treat narcolepsy.
Alcohol is a depressant, which means that it decreases the activity of your nervous system. Concerta, on the other hand, is a stimulant medication. It increases the activity of your nervous system. Concerta can also cause dependence in some people. With dependence, your body needs the drug in order for you to feel normal. Concerta can interact with several other medications. It can also interact with certain supplements as well as certain foods.
Different interactions can cause different effects. For instance, some interactions can interfere with how well a drug works.
Other interactions can increase the number of side effects or make them more severe. Below are lists of medications that can interact with Concerta. These lists do not contain all the drugs that may interact with Concerta. Before taking Concerta, talk with your doctor and pharmacist. Tell them about all prescription, over-the-counter, and other drugs you take. Also tell them about any vitamins, herbs, and supplements you use. Sharing this information can help you avoid potential interactions.
If you have questions about drug interactions that may affect you, ask your doctor or pharmacist. Taking Concerta with Prozac fluoxetine can possibly cause a drug interaction. Concerta is a stimulant medication that acts on your central nervous system CNS. Caffeine is also a stimulant.
Products that contain caffeine include coffee, soda, and certain teas and headache or pain medications. When caffeine and Concerta are taken together, you can have increased side effects, such as feeling irritable or anxious.
Both caffeine and Concerta can cause trouble sleeping and can increase your heart rate and blood pressure. If you enjoy drinking coffee, tea, or soda, try drinking decaffeinated forms while you are taking Concerta.
Taking Concerta with Zoloft sertraline can cause a drug interaction. Concerta can block the breakdown of Zoloft in your body. This can increase your levels of Zoloft.
This will help prevent you from having too much Zoloft in your body. Concerta can interact with Lexapro escitalopram if these drugs are taken together. This can cause your levels of Lexapro to increase. Clonidine is a medication that can be used to lower high blood pressure. Concerta can cause an increase in your blood pressure. Taking Concerta with clonidine may decrease the effects of clonidine, which can increase your blood pressure.
In rare instances, this increased blood pressure has resulted in death. MAOIs are a class of medications that are used to treat depression and anxiety. Examples of MAOIs include:. These medications should never be taken with Concerta. Using Concerta along with an MAOI can cause stroke , heart attack , kidney failure, and sudden death. Taking Concerta with warfarin Coumadin can cause a drug interaction. Concerta can block the breakdown of warfarin in your body. These tests will check the thickness of your blood, which is affected by warfarin.
You may have to have blood tests done more often when you first start Concerta than you did before you started the drug. These seizure medications include:. This can be very dangerous. If you need to take Concerta in combination with a seizure medication, your doctor may decrease the dosage of your seizure medication.
Your doctor may also do blood tests to make sure that levels of the seizure medication in your body are not too high. Taking Concerta with a vasopressor may not be safe. Vasopressors are a class of medications that are used to treat low blood pressure. Examples of vasopressors include:. Both vasopressors and Concerta cause your blood pressure to increase. Taking vasopressors with Concerta can cause your blood pressure to be even higher, which may become dangerous.
However, you should still check with your doctor or pharmacist before using any of these products while taking Concerta. Concerta is a stimulant medication that can cause an increase in your blood pressure and heart rate.
Caffeine can also cause these same effects in your body. While taking Concerta, you should avoid consuming foods and drinks that contain caffeine. Examples of foods and drinks that contain caffeine include:. Consuming any of the foods or beverages listed above in combination with Concerta can increase your risk of side effects, such as:.
If you feel that you need some caffeine, talk with your doctor about how much caffeine is safe for you to consume. You can also call the American Association of Poison Control Centers at or use their online tool.
But if your symptoms are severe, call or go to the nearest emergency room right away. Multiple treatment options are typically used together to treat attention deficit hyperactivity disorder ADHD. Along with Concerta, treatment should include psychological, educational, and social therapies. Some other therapies that may be used in combination with Concerta include:. If Concerta was prescribed for you or your child, your doctor may talk with you about other treatments that should be used with Concerta.
If you have questions about other treatment options for ADHD, talk with your doctor. If you need financial support to pay for Concerta, help is available. Janssen Pharmaceuticals, Inc.
Concerta should be taken once each day in the morning. It should be taken at about the same time every day. Concerta can be taken with or without food.
In clinical trials , Concerta worked the same way when it was taken with a big meal as it did when it was taken on an empty stomach. If Concerta upsets your stomach or causes nausea, it may be better for you to take it with food. Taking the medication with food in your stomach can reduce these side effects. No, Concerta should never be split, crushed, or chewed. Concerta tablets have special layers inside of them. Each layer releases some of the medication over the course of about 12 hours.
If you chew or break the tablets, these layers can release the medication all at once. Best effects: emotional stability, motivation, bouncing back fast if distracted or forgetful, making intent equal action. Side effects: very small and short-lived, e. When I first started taking them I did notice an improvement and I shed a few pounds too!
I started at the normal 5 mg dosage and then I started increasing my dosage according to my tolerance level. It was too much for me I was like the walking dead!
I started Concerta in October, and it seemed like suddenly I started packing on the pounds. My appetite has increased and my metabolism has slowed down it seems like. I started taking Concerta 18 mg 10 months ago for making mistakes at work. I immediately noticed a feeling like my head was clear and I could concentrate. Gradually it got back to where it was and my doctor increased the dose to 27 mg. Again, my head felt clear at first, but gradually that effect was unnoticeable.
I will never take Concerta again! After only one low dose, I got very aggressive and I felt like I had no control over my own body and mind. I got really anxious and worried. I also started to feel really paranoid. For me, when I take Concerta 36mg, I know it works because I find it easier to manage my thoughts and to focus on key tasks.
At the same time I know that taking Concerta, though helpful to feeling motivated, is not a guarantee that I will feel motivated. My daughter takes Concerta 18mg. When she takes it too late in the morning, she may have difficulty falling asleep at night.
On those evenings, I give her chamomile tea and allow her to wind down with a book during bedtime. So far, it has been working well for her. I have the opposite problem. In high school, I took Concerta every morning before leaving for school at 7 AM. I would then inevitably crash between and 9 pm, which caused some serious problems in my extra curricular activities.
Falling asleep in the middle of a band concert tends to be viewed as rather disrespectful… I usually experience about a 30 minute period of complete and utter exhaustion about hours after taking the drug.
I started taking 18mg of Concerta about 6 weeks ago. Two weeks ago, I tried 27mg instead of 18— because my doctor felt that it was needed and I did too. However, by the next Sunday my irritability had gone through the rood, I had developed all of the side effects including a rash. So, after this I was moved back down to the 18mg tablet.
All of the other side effects have gone away by today except for the rash. Not only does it blister and peel, but it itches. I want to rip my skin off sometimes. Diagnosed in Jan, got perscription in March, started yestorday. My son is taking Concerta We are on day 2.
The teacher said today he stayed in his seat, he looks normal to me just a little calmer. Im shocked really. He doesnt want lunch but has a big breakfast and dinner. Applesauce is too thin. Either way it works. I was scared but its okay.. Quite the opposite, we thought he needed a higher dose. Our son was a senior in high school, and has been on Concerta since Kindergarten. He takes two pills to make one dose. Otherwise he was awful in the morning. This spring he started failing classes deemed the easiest class schedule for a senior that his special education teachers had ever seen.
One class was ceramics! At first we thought it was senioritis, then we thought maybe the new girlfriend, then I asked my teen to talk to his doctor about a higher dose. That was denied because he needs to gain weight. He was in a car accident and ticketed for distracted driving, and had two more tickets in the month of April. It was the drugs!
I called the doctor. My teen was 18 and I could no longer talk to her. She called my teen back. I had him meet me there and sign the form. Then we were granted an emergency meeting with the doctor, which my teen missed!! Around this time I discovered my teen had been switched to this new generic in January, and was never notified!!!
Especially to a new drug!!! It was absolute garbage for my child and did nothing for him. His senior year was ruined. He had become moody, irritable, irrational, extremely sad and lost his self esteem.
It should have been the best time of his life, and instead he chose not to go to PROM. On top of that his job was delivering pizzas. When I went to pick up the 7 day supply they asked me why not the generic by Actavis. I called Express Scripts…again my only options were Mylan and brand name. I asked for a supervisor, and went three levels up. I was so angry, and felt betrayed! And they would gladly rip me off in the process!!! I hope all drug and PBM execs lose their jobs and drivers licenses and need to be hauled around by their parents!!!
Greedy, horrible people!!! Diagnosed nearly 6 years ago primarily inattentive and since then, have been on the generic for Concerta 54mg after some trial and error. Rare bread.
I have been on Concerta 18mg for about a month now I believe. I find it really helps me focus and retain information and be able to listen a lot more carefully to people, and it has definitely reduced the urge I have to interrupt or answer a question before it has even been fully asked. It has even made my writing nicer somehow, maybe because it is slowing my mind down? However, maybe it is because the dose is the lowest and I need a higher one, but, I find it has not necessarily helped with how fast I talk or how fast I do everything, leaving me to accidentally hurt myself HA, or not fully finish my thought or add more thoughts when I am talking.
Dosage increased up to 72mg but did not feel like there were sufficient benefits so have asked for my medication to be changed again. Currently wheening off at a drop of 18mg every 4 days, and whilst i had no side effects going on, coming off is different.
By 3pm i feel irritable, emotional and fragile. The Adderall worked perfect for focus but came with the side effect of trichotillomania and mood swings. So far the Concerta has greatly reduced the trichotillomania and nearly eliminated the mood swings.
Hopefully it proves to be enough though. I changed back and forth between adderrall and vyvanse for a few years. I take mg of Zoloft and 2mg of Clonazepam.
In November of this year, I flew to a country where they did not have adderrall, vyvanse, or zenzeti. I started on 72mg of concerta. While the effects of Vyvanse are what I consider to be best, concerta seems to work well enough. It does indeed give me headaches. For the first week I took it, I also experienced sleeplessness. I really could not fall asleep at night.
Fortunately, the sleeplessness has gone away. I have two children with ADHD….. My daughter is now 11 and has tried Adderall and Vyvanse in the past, both made her very emotional and moody….
Vyvanse made her very aggressive! It was so hard experimenting with the different medications till we finally found Concerta and BAM! What a difference! Her attention really perked up and because we do Karate together, I noticed a complete difference in her ability to focus and perform.
She was winning medals, feeling confident and her self esteem soared! I feed her a huge breakfast because I do notice that it effects her appetite once she takes the 27mg pill shortly after. She is a bit on the thin side, but nothing too worrisome and her energy level is still as high as always. She goes to a private school with most kids without disabilities, and has an aide that helps to refocus her 40 percent of the time she is at school. She is on a competitive swim team and a green belt in Karate, she is able to be an average student in a highly rated school….
She recently has started menstrating so we have had to increase the dose to 36 mg as puberty has effected the effectiveness. She was crashing and exhausted at around 4pm after taking 1 dose at 7;30 am. This higher dose helps her till about 7;00 pm. Insomnia can be a factor if she takes another pill or takes her dose in the afternoon. Her brother is 8 and takes 18mg. I notice it helps him as well, no effect on appetite, he loves his food, but it does help him with his focus in Karate.
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