Lamictal Rash

[unipolarbear]

So my pdoc meeting was intense yesterday sine I have been symptomatic (her word). I guess I have been. And I guess I titrated up too much, too fast on the Lamictal (after stopping involuntarily [not recommended]) SHe described what the steven's johnson syndrome is like and it made me freak out for the rest of the day. But I seem to be tolerating it well -- physically -- even though it has made me 'crazy' on 400mg. So we're backing off to 300mg.

But I said all that to say this:

Has anyone's skin actually fallen off that you know of? I have never heard of it on the few internet sites that I'm on. Pdoc says that you go to the burn unit and get treated there. I've only read about the red splotchies and itchiness. Anyone experience their skin falling off?

(I'm not being funny and am not trying to test the waters of lamictal overdosage. My levels are 8 on a scale that goes from 5-18.)

[Persephone]

I do know someone who had Stevens-Johnson syndrome (not from Lamictal though) due to a drug allergy. Her skin did fall off, although she survived and was not disfigured or blinded.

[Kyzr]

I don't personally know anyone to have gotten The Rash, but I have heard of people getting it. I suppose it could cause your skin to peel or flake, etc., depending on how long it goes without treatment... but it would take a great deal of time for it to do so in most cases...like....weeks. If you start to get a rash, any rash while on Lamictal, I imagine that you'd tell someone about it immediately. So, it's very, very unlikely that this would happen to you. No need to freak.

[crazynotstupid]

I've never had skin fall off, so no SJS, but damn I've had rashes up the wazoo. Any rash that's more than a minor annoyance should be checked out. I even had one biopsied. So anything that's beyond my comfort level, I have a doc--pdoc or gdoc or both--check out.

[San]

I got the rash.

I woke up, noticed I was really spotty.

I had a day pass from the hospital, I went home, had a shower, got dressed, I was bright purple.

My mom, of course, (I was 18) freaked out, took me back to the psych ward. Doctor goes "could be the Wellbutrin" and I nearly punched him. I told him, "They upped my Lamictal 50mg last night".

He hummed and hawwed, and told me to start tapering off of it. Until I was completely off of it, I had the rash.

It never got bad enough for my skin to fall off though, I had some sores, I was colourful for a few days.

I think with a medication like that, you'd have to be pretty ignorant of side effects to let it get to the point where its a really, really dangerous rash. I took Tegretol, and stopped immediately when I heard that it can cause Steven-Johnson's. I was itchy all of the time, and woke up with a rash once in a while. I talked to a pharmacist, she helped out.

I think they gave me some Benadryl, also.