Side effects of sleeping pills
After taking sleeping pills, will you never wake up again?
If I take sleeping pills, will I never wake up again?
This is many people’s biggest fear about sleeping pills.
In the past, this problem may have been serious, because old-fashioned sleeping pills, such as bromides, barbiturates, etc., were very toxic, and the lethal dose was very close to the therapeutic dose. If you were not careful, you could die. Maybe if you overdo it, you will really never wake up again, and it's a shame.
For example: You can sleep after taking three and a half tablets of a certain medicine, but you will be poisoned after taking six tablets. One day you took one pill, but it didn’t work (the therapeutic dose was not reached); you took two pills, but it didn’t work; three pills, it still didn’t work. As a result, you get angry and want to say that three pills have no effect, so you take three more pills in one go - what do you think will happen?
Will sleeping pills harm your body?
Many people are worried that sleeping pills will harm their health and therefore refuse to take them. Will sleeping pills harm the body? It's hard to say, because it's really hard to define what it means to harm the body. For example: barbiturates will enhance the metabolic function of the liver, which is also known as "enhancing the detoxification function", but this is a double-sided blade: on the one hand, the liver will accelerate the detoxification of poisons; on the other hand, the liver will It also quickly metabolizes nutrients in the body, such as vitamins. As a result, no matter whether it was good or bad, it was all gone. Do you think this will hurt your health or not?
Another example: Anxiety will stimulate the sympathetic nervous system, and a large amount of sympathetic nerve substances will be released into the blood vessels, which will cause problems such as accelerated heartbeat and elevated blood pressure. In the long run, it will damage cardiovascular function and even cause cardiovascular disease. Lead to myocardial infarction or stroke. After giving BZD, anxiety will decrease and it will naturally have a protective effect on these organs; however, BZD may cause memory loss - in this case, is it considered harmful to the body or not? Similarly, if you insist on not taking medicine, but the result is long-term insomnia, will this be better for your health?
So in medicine, we cannot look at things in dichotomy, nor can we be like quacks who say indiscriminately that "all Western medicines will harm the body." We can only make use of the advantages of each drug and avoid its disadvantages based on the current situation, maximize the effect and minimize the side effects.
Looking at things this way, we can instead discuss sleeping pills in terms of "effects on the body." Since the current sleeping pills are mainly BZD and OMEGA-1 active drugs, supplemented by auxiliary sleeping pills (antihistamines, tricyclic antidepressants, Trazodone, antipsychotics), we will not mention the old-fashioned sleeping pills at all.
Possible side effects of various sleeping pills
“Excessive sedation, feeling groggy when you get up the next day” is a very common side effect, no matter which kind of sleeping pill, BZD Whether it is auxiliary sleeping pills or even OMEGA-1 acting drugs, this phenomenon may be caused.
The main causes are excessive sedation and continued drug residue. Although some drugs have short half-lives and theoretically should not cause such symptoms, everyone's physical condition is different, the speed of absorption or metabolism of drugs may be different, and the strength of drug reactions may also be different, so even short-acting drugs Sleeping pills may also make people drowsy the next day and make it difficult to concentrate.
So, while taking sleeping pills, you are not allowed to operate machines or drive. Of course, it is difficult to completely avoid it in practice, but at least you must reduce the time you spend operating machines or driving. If you can't do it, don't do it. When there is no way to avoid it, you have to be careful.
Loss of coordination in movement
There are many muscles in human beings. When doing any movement, all muscles must be coordinated to move together, otherwise it will cause a joke, as in the last Simply hold chopsticks. If the five fingers do their own thing, let alone reaching out to pick things, you can't even hold the chopsticks. The cerebellum is responsible for much of this coordination work, but BZD suppresses the cerebellum. As a result, movement coordination is not smooth, and it becomes difficult to dress, write, etc. Fortunately, under normal dosage, this phenomenon is unlikely to occur. Even if it does occur, it will return to normal as long as the dosage is reduced or the drug effect slowly fades.
Excessive muscle relaxation
BZD will suppress the nerves in the spinal cord and make the muscles relax. In layman's terms, not only the brain is asleep, but the muscles are also asleep.
Once the brain is awake but the muscles are sleeping, people will feel that the whole body is limp, have no strength at all, and cannot work.
This may not be a bad thing for people who have long-term excessive muscle tightness. But for the elderly, they may accidentally fall when they get up. If they fall and injure their heads, it will be a big problem.
Memory is affected
Some people do not fall asleep immediately after taking sleeping pills. They can continue to do things and talk to people, but fall asleep after a while. When I got up the next day, I forgot everything I had done. This kind of temporary amnesia is more likely to occur with powerful sleeping pills, whether they are BZD or OMEGA-1 acting drugs. But this is only temporary and will not affect memory.
Out-of-control behavior and sleepwalking
In life, there are always some unsatisfactory things hidden deep in the heart, but BZD will weaken the power of psychological suppression, resulting in inner suppressed anger and emotions , let it out to your heart’s content. Some people will become angry and agitated after taking it; some people will walk around unconsciously, pick up things, move things, and even go shopping outside. In severe cases, they will engage in inappropriate behaviors, such as taking off their clothes in public, etc. I couldn't remember the incident at all afterwards.
Respiratory depression
When patients have certain respiratory or neurological diseases, the use of BZD may cause respiratory depression. When BZD is used together with alcohol, this effect will be enhanced. However, it is generally not a serious problem. Allergy: A few patients have special constitutions and are allergic to sleeping pills. No matter which drug they are, they may cause allergies.
Sexual function is affected
There are reports that BZD can cause sexual dysfunction in rare cases. Tricyclic antidepressants may also cause impotence and loss of sexual desire. As for Trazodone, it may prolong a man's erection, but this is reversible and will not cause organ damage or permanent impairment. This is different from the effect of alcohol. Long-term use of alcohol may cause permanent impairment of sexual function.
Gastrointestinal discomfort
Zolpidem or Zopiclone may cause side effects of dizziness, nausea, vomiting and diarrhea, but the probability of occurrence is low. Tricyclic antidepressants may cause similar problems.
Side effects that only occur with auxiliary hypnotics
Extrapyramidal side effects and endocrine effects (rare)
Some tricyclic antidepressants and antipsychotics Because of the anti-dopamine effect, extrapyramidal side effects can occur, such as acute muscle atonia, Parkinson's symptoms, and akathisia. In addition, it may also cause prolactin to rise, which may cause women to stop menstruation, men to produce breast milk, and male and female sexual desire to decrease. But when these drugs are used as sleep aids, such problems are almost impossible to occur.
Three tablets plus three tablets, one to six tablets, oh no, you are poisoned!
It’s so easy. The jump from therapeutic dose to dangerous dose is too close. The difference in safety can be imagined. Moreover, everyone’s constitution and physical condition are different, and no one is sure what to eat. How many tablets are effective and how many tablets will cause poisoning. Doctors have no way to prevent it in advance. To make matters worse, old-fashioned sleeping pills are highly addictive and can easily be enhanced by alcohol. If someone is drunk and takes a few more tablets in a daze, the toxicity will be doubled, and they will really never wake up again.
The commonly used sleeping pills are no longer easy to cause death
But these are all things of the past. Since the invention of BZD, its lethal dose has been far away from the therapeutic dose. Many people have taken hundreds of sleeping pills - the author has even seen patients who took a thousand pills and fell into a deep sleep, but still could not die.
However, the author once saw a patient who died after taking a large amount of sleeping pills and toast bread. After an autopsy, it was discovered that the toast bread choked in the trachea and suffocated to death. Therefore, after taking sleeping pills, it is best to wait calmly until you want to sleep before going to sleep. Don't do too many things. It is better if you have someone else with you.
What is more likely to cause problems now are other drugs that assist sleep, such as low-dose antipsychotics, tricyclic antidepressants, etc., which may cause strong anti-acetylcholine effects when taken in large amounts. , may affect brain and heart function, causing coma or even death.
But basically, the use of this type of sleep-aiding drugs is rare. Generally, they are only used to assist BZDs when the amount of BZD sleeping pills is already very large. Moreover, except for psychiatrists, general doctors are unlikely to use such drugs.
So, based on the current situation, it is unlikely that someone will wake up after taking sleeping pills, unless the patient himself has some problems, or the medicines he takes conflict with each other, etc. . These problems need to be diagnosed by a doctor and drug use monitored to avoid dangers.
However, despite this, many people are still afraid of sleeping pills. Investigating the reasons, there may be the following two points:
Social labeling
Before the invention of BZD, many people did commit suicide by taking sleeping pills, or died from overdose. Through extensive publicity in the media, society generally has a "dangerous" impression of sleeping pills, not only among the general public, but also among doctors. Naturally, people will reject sleeping pills.
Psychological feelings
Sleep itself is a very strange experience. During sleep, "oneself" seems to fly to nowhere, and that period of time is blank. No wonder As it turns out, in Greek mythology, the God of Sleep and the God of Death are brothers. They can still wake up from sleep, but death can't help them. Subjectively, sleep is like a brief death, during which you can do nothing - because "you" are simply gone!
This is very mysterious. I can talk, I can think, I can be angry, I can run around, but there is no way to make "me" disappear.
Sleeping pills can just solve this problem. As soon as the medicine is taken, the person falls asleep without any explanation, as if he is dead. Many people feel an involuntary feeling, as if they are being pushed into another world by some external thing, which is very scary. This kind of fear manifests itself in resistance to sleeping pills.
In fact, these are all over the top. Sleeping pills were invented by humans and are tools to serve humans. Researchers will work hard to make sleeping pills safer, and doctors will also analyze your physical condition to further enhance safety, so you don’t have to worry too much - even if you feel like you are being forced to fall asleep, Why not? After all, we are its masters. You also know that sleep is only short-lived. When the time comes, you will wake up eventually. Why be too afraid?
Do sleeping pills have many side effects?
Are there many side effects?
You may still feel uneasy: "I looked through the professional pharmacopoeia, and there are all kinds of side effects written in it. Are these also fake?" Many people are worried and go to the bookstore to check the pharmacopoeia. I looked at a bunch of chemical drug names: Triazolam, Estazolam, Clonezepam, Diazepam, Zolpi-dem, Zopiclone, Lorazepam... I was dazzled and confused; what was even more terrifying were the "contraindications" and "side effects" underneath. I wrote a lot, ranging from "risk of death" and "teratogenicity" to "may be dangerous when operating machinery" and "nausea and vomiting". Each one is shocking. I really didn't know it was a drug. Or drugs.
In fact, these are all true, but if you read more about other drugs, you will find that other drugs have more side effects than sleeping pills!
The key to the problem is that the pharmacopoeia does not record the probability of occurrence, timing of occurrence, and considerations of gains and losses. For example, "Will you get hit by a car while walking?" Of course! If you just close your eyes and cross the fast lane at a red light, will you be hit by a car? The problem is: you won't do this, you will know that when the light is green, it is much safer to cross the zebra crossing and pay attention to the cars coming from the left and right.
The same goes for taking sleeping pills. However, the doctor will help you pay attention to "traffic safety": the elderly? Metabolism may be poor; edema? Albumin may be too low, affecting the effect of the drug; are there scars on the face? There may have been previous trauma that affected the brain's interaction with the drug. Doctors should pay attention to these and understand them carefully. Once understood and carefully evaluated, even if sleeping pills have side effects, there will be no serious problems in using them.
What's more, the probability of side effects of current sleeping pills is not high. If you are anxious about something that is unlikely to happen, isn't it the same as "being afraid of a car accident and never going out for the rest of your life"?
There is no absolutely safe road, and safety can only be ensured by abiding by traffic rules; similarly, there is no absolutely safe sleeping pill, but as long as you abide by the rules of medication, there will be no serious problems.
Are sleeping pills addictive?
“Even if current sleeping pills are very safe, will they be addictive?” This is a problem that causes many people to not want to take medication. It is true that many sleeping pills have the risk of addiction, which is currently the biggest obstacle to medication use. However, there are many kinds of drugs, and the chances of addiction are also different. You can choose drugs with less addictive properties. If you use them for a short period of time, there is less risk of addiction. This depends on the doctor's consideration of the medication and medication time based on the condition. This problem is not as serious as generally imagined, and if the disease improves, the need for medication will naturally be reduced. No medical textbook recommends unlimited use of sleeping pills. Therefore, if your doctor is fully trained and has medical ethics, he will not ask you to take medicine if you are not sick. In the same way, if he prescribes medicine, he thinks that your condition requires medicine.
Is it better to take Chinese medicine?
"Will taking Chinese medicine have less side effects? Is it better than taking sleeping pills?"
This is a common myth. In fact, Chinese medicine is also medicine, and many current Western medicines are obtained from nature, such as aspirin, antibiotics, etc.
In order to survive, many natural creatures are also toxic. For example, drugs such as marijuana and opium are also herbal medicines. Improper use of Western medicine can harm the body, and the same goes for Chinese medicine. There is no saying that one is gentler than the other, or that one is more harmful to the body than the other. Both are medicines, so be careful. Of course, if you take traditional Chinese medicine and it works, that’s great. If it doesn’t, it doesn’t necessarily guarantee that there will be no side effects.
Why should we rely on drugs instead of relying on ourselves?
People with insomnia often have more or less uneasiness or fear about sleep. They will even be afraid when the sky turns dark, the thought of going to sleep, or the sight of the bed. As soon as I lie down in bed, the more I want to rely on my own strength and force myself to fall asleep, the less I can relax. What should I do if I can’t sleep well? What will happen tomorrow? In this situation, a vicious circle occurs.
Perhaps, many people still have strong psychological barriers to psychiatry - from registering, waiting for treatment, calling the number, walking into the clinic, facing the doctor's inquiry... it takes a lot of courage to face it. . Similarly, psychiatric drugs are also a kind of psychological disorder, which requires a lot of effort to break through.
However, put aside this psychological barrier and think about the real needs of the body: being in a state of constant insomnia, reduced memory and understanding, bad temper, lack of energy, and feeling confused all day long. It will cause obstacles in work, life and interpersonal relationships, or cause sleep during the day and inability to sleep at night. In a vicious cycle, insomnia will continue, which is definitely not a good idea.
How can we stop this vicious cycle and stop it from continuing? Many people may have tried many methods, such as relaxation techniques, drinking milk, taking baths, etc., but the results are not consistent. In fact, medication is also a good method. It has a high success rate in making insomniacs fall asleep and calm down. Examine the causes of insomnia and find solutions. Once the insomnia improves, the medication can be gradually reduced. In this way, it is a virtuous circle.
Actually, if you think about it carefully - never taking sleeping pills is just like absolutely taking sleeping pills, both are biased. If your condition and symptoms require you to eat reasonably and appropriately, then sleeping pills will be the best weapon against insomnia.
The side effects of minors taking sleeping pills are more serious