HOW TO SUCCESSFULLY TREAT BDD WITH MEDICATION: RECOMMENDATIONS IF AN SRI DOESN’T WORK WELL ENOUGH?
HOW TO SUCCESSFULLY TREAT BDD WITH MEDICATION: RECOMMENDATIONS IF AN SRI DOESN’T WORK WELL ENOUGH?What if an SRI doesn’t work or works only partially? This is an important question that you may face. Some people are pleased enough with a partial response that they don’t want to pursue additional treatment. Others, however want to further improve. While there are very little research data on this question, my clinical experience suggests that a number of approaches may be effective.Optimize the SRI you’re already on: This means following the above guidelines to the extent that you can, taking a high enough dose for a long enough time. It doesn’t make sense to give up on an SRI if you haven’t given it a good enough try. As I’ve mentioned, some people benefit from exceeding the maximum dose recommended by the pharmaceutical company (excluding clomipramine [Anafranil) and tolerate it fine. If optimizing the SRI doesn’t work well enough for you, there are two major approaches you can take:1) “Augment” the SRI: One approach is called augmentation. With this approach, you continue the ineffective or partially effective SRI and add another medicine to the SRI to augment, or boost, the SRI’s effect.2) Switch to another SRI: The second approach is called switching. With this approach, you discontinue the SRI and try another SRI. *263\204\8*
