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Dr. Andrew Rynne
MD
Dr. Andrew Rynne

Family Physician

Exp 50 years

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Suggest Medication For Musculoskeletal Pain

Hello!

I suffer from chronic widespread musculoskeletal pain - predominately through my back & neck. I am male, 30, and have had this problem since i was 19 - a decade of constant, unrelenting pain. I've been treated with virtually every painkiller there is over the years but opioids are the only ones that work; i've been on oxycodone & morphine for about three years now, & am currently on Oxycontin (SR) 40mg bd (so 80mg oxycodone daily) + morphine SO4 30mg bd prn (60mg daily) for breakthrough pain (in addition to alprazolam 2mg bd prn ("Xanax" 4mg), desvenlafaxine ("Pristiq") 100mg od & methylphenidate 20mg tid (60mg Ritalin daily) [for generalised anxiety disorder, recurring depression & ADHD, respectively]). Which is a fair bit for a young man like myself I know...

But my question is regarding this: I have only just recently learnt about Flupirtine, a non-opioid, non-NSAID nor any other category analgesic, which has been proven in numerous clinical trials since before it hit the market in 1991 (in both qual. & quant. analyses), to be AT LEAST as effective for both acute & chronic SEVERE pain as high-dose high-potency narcotic analgesics including oxycodone, morphine, methadone, and even diamorphine, inter alia!

Flupirtine has, amazingly, been around for a full 20 years now, & has even had amazing success treating Fibromyalgia - even more so than high-dose morphine, fentanyl, etc. - yet with NO addiction potential, NO tolerance, NO CNS-depressant effects & not a single reported case of misuse, abuse or addiction!

I know: sounds too good to be true doesn't it? Astonishingly however, it only seems to be licensed in a very few countries, including Germany, which is from where I have just, in the last week, managed to obtain a box of 14 XR (one/day) tablets, through an online pharmacy escrow called goldpharma, and am currently on my fourth day of a fortnight's trialling it. So far, it does seem to be helping: I've been taking less of my opiates but have actually found the pain to be tolerable most of the time over the last few days, which is truly incredible - & I have not noticed a single side-effect either!

But flupirtine is not available here in Australia, and my GP had never even heard of it, though naturally found it quite intriguing. There is remarkably little info about it that I've been able to find, but I want to know more about it: are there any common s/efx I should be aware of? Will it interact with any of my other medications? What is the dose range, does it make a difference if you take higher, or lower doses, or is 400mg a day THE established dose? (These tabs are 400mg XR & I believe last 24hrs though the instruction leaflet is in German & mine is very limited...) And how does it work?? (I read pharmacology so you can be technical!) And why is this drug only seemingly available in Germany given its (to my knowledge) better-than-any-other-drug-ever-invented benefit/risk ratio?

From what I know of it so far it should be an essential medicine & first-line treatment in every country (unlike paracetamol (acetaminophen) which destroys one's liver even when taken at 1g qid; as well as being as effective at relieving pain as throwing a glass of water on a forest fire, causes more deaths than any other drug & should be banned globally!)...

Of course, the absolute best painkiller ever discovered remains diamorphine, even though the UK (where i'm from) appears to be the only country to recognise this and utilise it medicinally, which is an utter travesty! - But if flupirtine works out as well as I'm hoping, & comes to be researched, recognised & utilised around the world (as it deserves to be), it could very well come to be the single greatest breakthrough in medicine since penicillin!

So, now I'm sure I've got your attention - who can answer my questions & tell me more about this exceptional drug? (I have some other questions as well but these take precedence...)
Many thanks! :)
posted on Thu, 13 Mar 2014
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