Concerta?

My 16y.o. daughter was on it for 1 month. It worked wonders for her ADD! But then she started having severe TICS. They were so severe she ended up in the emergency room 2 times. She looked like she was having seizures for 8 hours. The Dr.’s tell me the tics were triggered by the Concerta, but that she had a tic disorder, that we did not know about. She was then put on Imipramine. The severe tics started all over again. She went medicine free for 3 months. We are now trying Wellbutrin. No side effects, but so far no help for her ADD.

My 11 year old daughter was on it for less than a week. It may have worked wonders in the day at school, but she was not my child at night. She was a complete motormouth, bounced off the walls, nervous as a cat and couldn’t go to sleep at all. My pediatrician offered a pill to sleep, but good grief, drugs to counteract the drugs? No thanks.

For some kids, Concerta is wonderful, for some it isn’t. As with all meds, kids re-act differently on different meds. My 10 year old takes Ritalin, 10 mg 2x a day, school days only. We tried Concerta for less than 2 weeks and discontinued. Even tho it’s Ritalin in a different delivery system, it didn’t work for him. It didn’t touch his attention problems, plus made him very emotional. It also gave him a headache/stomach ache the within one hour of taking it.

In the hopes of finding a once a day dose, we are currently trying Metadate CD with good results.

JulieinSC
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My 10 yr old son was on Concerta for a few mos. He became severly depressed and having obssessive compulsive problems. He was having terrible thoughts that he couldn’t stop and cried all the time .We went without any meds for 6 mo. We homeschool so it was an option .We started him on Imipramine and he is not as depressed and actually (after6 wks) was able to do a long division problem without getting up 5 or6 times! Jan

I have two ADHD/Gifted/LD boys. 11 and 12. One is on concerta one is on Dexedrine. My oldest child had tics and other side effects when taking ritalin,my other son did not. At one point we tried adderall,both had rebound as the drug wore off too quickly. Concerta was the best thing that ever happened to my youngest,and dexedrine for my oldest. Kids are different,all meds can have side effects. SInce their diagnosis they both have been on or tried multiple medications. It is a trial and error kind of thing. The important point is if there are undesirable effects,then investigation into whether the dosage is wrong or the med is wrong needs to happen. Since Concerta is ritalin,just in a different form,a child who did not have good effect from ritalin,will probably be not successful on concerta. If the issue is the medication wearing off and causing rebound,then the dosage might be in need of adjustment.Once my oldest who is the family insomniac,was on the correct dose of dexedrine,he was able to sleep,he couldn’t attend and experienced rebound,causing him to be too hyper to sleep,it wasn’t that the med was causing him to not sleep,it was the ADHD causing him to not sleep.He takes a dose again later in the day which helps the sleeping problem. Rebound is when the med wears off too quickly causing even more severe symptoms of hyperactivity. The trick,as my dev. pedi. explained to me,is to have the med taper out of the system not crash. Concerta has been very successful for this. Dosage is very important also. The concerta capsule has a sponge in it. There is a small hole in the top of the capsule. When stomach contents make the sponge wet it expands pushing the medication out into the system thorugh out the day,because of this mechanism 20% of the med can be retained in the capsule causing a too small of a dose. Due to this a larger dosage should be used. We started on 36mg,and wound up going to 54 this has been a perfect dose,for my son. Meds work with the bodies metabolism,some kids metabolize quicker then other,where others metabolism might be slower,not necessarily a direct result of body weight,although obviously body weight and dosage will be a factor also.Doctors are giving clonidine at night to help with sleeping,and aggressive behaviors. It is a blood pressure medication for adults and due to the side effect of drowsiness it works on children for sleep. It has not been found to be harmful to children,but blood pressure should be periodicly checked. A child with anxiety issues,or depressive issues should not be taking a stimulant as the first course of possible medications. Some it works fine for,others do not do as well. Individuality plays a role,even with the use of medication.

Thanks for your comments on concerta’s delivery system- I never knew about the sponge. I’m thinking my son needs a higher dosage - he only takes 18 mg, 13, and 150 lbs. He crashed badly with ritalin and dexadrine, the concerta has been the only drug that helped that he could take. He does become a motor-mouth, though, and sometimes hyper - but I think you’re right - that’s the ADD. He sometimes uses clonodine, too, when I know he has to go to sleep, or has taken his concerta late. Anyway, I think I’ll call his doctor about upping his dose.

My eleven yr old son was switched from adderall to concerta, but because he went from a 10mg in the morning and a 5mg in the afternoon to Concerta 18mg capsule he was to groggy to do his school work, I homeschool him. So back to adderall we went.