What other drugs will affect Valium?
The mixing of any two or more drugs can cause unintended reactions. It is therefore important you are completely honest with your doctor when answering questions about health and dietary supplements, herbal remedies and other drugs you may be taking (whether prescription or street). For example, some of the over-the-counter antacids change the rate at which valium is absorbed from the stomach into the bloodstream. If your treatment depends on maintaining a stable concentration of the drug, taking an antacid can significantly change the level of the active ingredients over time.
The main problems come when the mixing makes the effect of both drugs more powerful. So, for example, because valium is a sedative, it depresses or slows down the body’s activity level. Taking any other drug with the same effect is therefore potentially dangerous. This includes alcohol which significantly enhances the sedative effect. It is therefore important never to mix any drugs which relieve anxiety through sedation, antihistamines used for treating allergies, sleeping pills, the more powerful painkillers and some antidepressants.
Some of the drugs used to treat liver and kidney disease can affect some of the liver enzymes. If this happens, the rate at which valium is processed and expelled from the body is significantly slowed. The longer the active ingredients stay in the bloodstream, the longer the sedative effect lasts.
If you are an epileptic and also taking phenytoin to control seizures, your doctor will need to give detailed advice on whether to add valium to the mixture. There is clear evidence that the mixture of the two slows the rate at which phenytoin is eliminated from the body. The risk of seizures may increase during the time you take both drugs and after ceasing the valium.
What should you know about dependence?
If you take valium at too high a dose or over too long a time or in combination with other drugs which are habit-forming, there is a real risk you will become dependent. This means you cannot stop taking valium suddenly. Your doctor will have to prescribe a slow reduction of the dosage to gradually break the habit.
What is rebound anxiety?
If you have been taking valium over a length of time, there is a risk the original symptoms will return in a stronger form if you stop taking the drug suddenly. So, the less serious levels of worry and anxiety can return in severe form unless you slowly reduce the dosage over time.
What are the main side effects?
The main effects are drowsiness, and a general sense of weakness and fatigue. These problems are aggravated if you have been drinking alcohol. Even without the help of alcohol, people can find their speech slurs, their hands tremble and they feel faint. Headaches are not uncommon. The stomach can be affected with associated effects in terms of vomiting and bowel movements (or the lack of them).
Less common but more serious are an allergic reaction to the valium itself, and more violent mood and psychological changes. Some people grow more agitated and aggressive, showing more violent rage and, rarely, delusional behavior. A small number of people have attempted suicide as depression can grow deeper. |
