Side effects
Contact your health care provider at once if you have any of the following symptoms:
The following serious side effects must be reported immediately to your doctor:
• Wear disease medical alert identification.
• Follow laws about driving with a seizure condition.
• If you have been taking this medicine for several weeks, talk with healthcare provider before stopping. You may want to gradually withdraw this medicine.
• If you have kidney disease, talk with healthcare provider.
• Check medicines with healthcare provider. This medicine may not mix well with other medicines.
• If taking for seizures, do not take antacids within 2 hours of this medicine.
• You may not be alert. Avoid driving, doing other tasks or activities until you see how this medicine affects you.
• Avoid alcohol (includes wine, beer, and liquor) or other medicines and natural products that slow your actions and reactions.
• Tell healthcare provider if you are pregnant or plan on getting pregnant.
• Tell healthcare provider if you are breast-feeding.
• Feeling lightheaded, sleepy, having blurred vision, or a change in thinking clearly. Avoid driving, doing other tasks or activities that require you to be alert or have clear vision until you see how this medicine affects you.
• Feeling dizzy. Rise slowly over several minutes from sitting or lying position. Be careful climbing.
• Change in balance.
• Shakiness.
• Swelling.
• Weight gain.
• Behavior problems.
• Emotional ups and downs.
• Nausea or vomiting. Small frequent meals, frequent mouth care, sucking hard, sugar-free candy, or chewing sugar-free gum may help.
• Hostility.
• If you suspect an overdose, call your local poison control center or emergency department immediately.
• Signs of a life-threatening reaction. These include wheezing; chest tightness; fever; itching; bad cough; blue skin color; fits; or swelling of face, lips, tongue, or throat.
Warnings
Before prescribing you with Gabapentin for pain, your doctor needs to know if you have any of the following conditions
Before discontinuing the use of Gabapentin, discuss doing so with your doctor as quickly withdrawing from treatment can cause withdrawal symptoms similar to other addictive agents (including alcohol.)
Drug interactions
The following drugs may interact with Gabapentin:
Give your doctor a list of all the medicines including over the counter drugs, herbs or dietary supplements you use.
• Signs or symptoms of depression, suicidal thoughts, nervousness, emotional ups and downs, abnormal thinking, anxiety, or lack of interest in life.
• Severe dizziness or passing out.
• Feeling extremely tired or weak.
• Severe nausea or vomiting.
• If seizures are worse or different after starting medicine.
• Unusual bruising or bleeding.
• Any rash.
• No improvement in condition or feeling worse.
Gabapentin was originally used to treat epilepsy but is currently used to treat many types of pain. Gabapentin is prescribed to prevent migraine headaches2, neuropathic pain3 and pathologic nystagmus (involuntary eye movement).4 Gabapentin is also at times used in conjunction with another pharmaceutical, flumazenil, in the treatment of methamphetamine, cocaine and alcohol addiction.1
(GA ba pen tin)
Apo-Gabapentin®; CO Gabapentin; Dom-Gabapentin; Mylan-Gabapentin; Neurontin®; Novo-Gabapentin; PHL-Gabapentin; PMS-Gabapentin; PRO-Gabapentin; RAN™-Gabapentin; ratio-Gabapentin; Riva-Gabapentin; ZYM-Gabapentin
• If you have an allergy to gabapentin or any other part of this medicine.
• Tell healthcare provider if you are allergic to any medicine. Make sure to tell about the allergy and how it affected you. This includes telling about rash; hives; itching; shortness of breath; wheezing; cough; swelling of face, lips, tongue, or throat; or any other symptoms involved.
• Take this medicine with or without food. Take with food if it causes an upset stomach.
• A liquid (solution) is available if you cannot swallow pills.
• Those who have feeding tubes can also use the liquid. Flush the feeding tube before and after medicine is given.
• Take a missed dose as soon as possible.
• If it is almost time for the next dose, skip the missed dose and return to your regular schedule.
• Do not take a double dose or extra doses.
• Do not change dose or stop medicine. Talk with healthcare provider.
• Change in condition being treated. Is it better, worse, or about the same?
• Follow up with healthcare provider.
• Store at room temperature.
• Protect from light.
• Protect capsules and tablets from moisture. Do not store in a bathroom or kitchen.
Created: 2006-10-13 12:48:18.0
Modified: 2010-03-19 14:38:13.0
Lexi-PALS TM © (1977)-(2007) Lexi-Comp, Inc. All rights reserved.
• This medicine is used to prevent or control seizures.
• This medicine is used to treat painful nerve diseases.
• If you have a life-threatening allergy, wear allergy identification at all times.
• Do not share your medicine with others and do not take anyone else's medicine.
• Keep all medicine out of the reach of children and pets.
• Most medicines can be thrown away in household trash after mixing with coffee grounds or kitty litter and sealing in a plastic bag.
• Keep a list of all your medicines (prescription, natural products, supplements, vitamins, over-the-counter) with you. Give this list to healthcare provider (doctor, nurse, nurse practitioner, pharmacist, physician assistant).
• Call your doctor for medical advice about side effects. You may report side effects to FDA at 1-800-FDA-1088 or in Canada to Health Canada's Canada Vigilance Program at 1-866-234-2345.
• Talk with healthcare provider before starting any new medicine, including over-the-counter, natural products, or vitamins.
