I took Zolpidem (a.k.a., Ambien) for 12 years. Last spring my doctor cut off my prescription without discussion. Around the same time my brother's doctor cut his prescription from 10mg to 5mg without discussion. At same time a fellow employee of my brother had her prescription cut off – without discussion also, I believe. Same time frame, I was refused a prescription for Zolpidem by an online nurse practitioner.
I cannot imagine a sufferer of, say, migraine headaches being treated in such a neglectful way -- in such an unscientific way -- to be left without treatment for a seriously debilitating condition (insomnia) without even a sit-down discussion.
What’s apparently scaring the doctors off is stats building up about accidents (at home and on the road) for the elderly – reported memory problems (for the great majority, including me nothing especially severe) and reports of strange behaviors (e.g., sleep driving) on Zolpidem. Doctors seem to jump away from these daunting side effects with an almost Pavlovian response – without ever considering that for insomnia there is no other sleep aid that does not have a half or all day after drug cloud to live with.
I DON’T WANT TO BE PROTECTED FROM FALLS IN THE KITCHEN AT THE EXPENSE OF LIVING MY LIFE IN SOME KIND OF HANGOVER MIASMA. That’s the issue our doctors somehow seem to miss wholeheartedly with UNIQUELY hangover free Zolpidem.
I speculate that is because – what I call the physical doctors; as opposed to the psychiatric practitioners -- can't measure insomnia; can't weigh it, can't take its temperature, can't sew it up, wouldn’t know where to sew it back – insomnia doesn’t really exist for them.
IOW, nobody’s knocking to ask them to open their motivational door – not nobody home; nobody even knocking – on a deep motivational level. So they don’t even get around to the purely scientific level that they are so deeply trained on.
There are 38 million Americans on Zolpidem – 85% of all sleep aid prescriptions. [At around 2012 -- down to just above10 million by 2020 -- see post above.] Are we going to take all of them off their most practical (no hanging on-hangover) and effective sleep aid just when they need it most? For my part I am going to seek a prescription from a psychiatrist. I am very optimistic. I think that with a doctor for whom insomnia is a tangible, palpable, corporeal thing – the argument against being consigned to a life in the miasma to protect against falls in the kitchen – or just losing sleep every night -- will be very compelling.
Notes: I can cut a 10mg tablet in three parts – and take one whatever time of night I can’t sleep. Only had five hours sleep? Take one piece: 25-45-50: 25 minutes to act-45 minute blank brain (unless I want to think about something)-50 minutes to waking, bright eyed and bushy tailed.
If I drive without taking the drug (after five hours sleep) I can feel less concentration and patience. No such lack of clarity if I take the drug as little as two hours earlier. If I were making druggie “mistakes” I would intellectually know it.
Note: My time-fitting (4 hours sleep to go) nights, OTC substitute -- Diphenhydramine: https://healthunlocked.com/redirect?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.medicalnewstoday.com%2Farticles%2F288546%23Taking-anticholinergics-for-more-than-3-years-linked-to-higher-dementia-risk
I also wake up from Diphenhydramine feeling like I’ve been hit by a truck. Great.
