Lexpro: A New Antidepressant Drug

2007-05-02 10:04:19

( Health )



Escitalopram or lexapro, sometimes misspelled as lexpro, is one of the antidepressant drugs available on the market today. Lexpro belongs to the family of drugs known as selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRI), which help increase the production of brain serotonin back to near-normal levels. If you have behavioral and emotional problems like anxiety and depression, your doctor may probably prescribe lexpro because you may have low levels of serotonin (neurotransmitter) in certain parts of your brain.

Before your health care provider will recommend starting lexpro as antidepressant meds, the doctor will first assess your physical examination and medical history. Some doctors may require you to undergo blood or urine tests to check if there are any as yet undiagnosed medical conditions that would not favor the use of the drug. The doctor or the clinic staff will measure height to weight ratios, pulse rate and take blood pressure readings as benchmark data.

In addition, the doctor will determine existence or a history of epileptic seizures, kidney or liver diseases, or diabetes since these are contraindications to lexpro. It is also important to inform the doctor of any history of manic-depressive, or bipolar, disorders or attempts at suicide.

If there is a decision to start lexpro treatments, the doctor will require regular appointments to gauge the effect of the antidepressant drugs, including an assessment of antidepressant side effects. The doctor will also want to calibrate the dose for possible adjustments, and to determine if the lexpro is still necessary or another drug will serve the treatment purpose better.

To guard against abnormal antidepressant weight changes, the nurse will again take measurements of height and weight during each check-up, and include pulse rate and blood pressure readings. It is likely that the doctor will run through a detailed checklist and rating scale to evaluate the presence of depression.


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