Terbinafine - two weeks on and it's still tasteless

Well, it's almost two weeks after I stopped taking the Terbinafine tablets and still everything I eat is like salty cardboard and everything I drink is like seawater. Mealtimes, which used to be a pleasure, are now a chore and I'm losing weight as I don't feel like eating.

The more research I do, the more I realise that there are many people out there suffering with this particular problem. Take a look here: http://www.askapatient.com/viewrating.asp?drug=21124&name=LAMISIL+AT&page=1&PerPage=60

Askpatient.com is a US site, but I have found others here in the UK too. In many of the cases, the patients have recorded that, when they reported the problem to their doctors, the latter were 'unaware' that the drug could cause this particular debilitating side-effect. Now, either that's because the doctors are reading information on the drug which doesn't highlight this problem or they feel that the trade-off for being free of the fungal infection is worth the reported three month's duration of taste loss. However, the majority of online reports I have read (like the one above), record patients as saying that if they'd known about the severity and duration of this problem - and the possibility that their taste may not return at all they would have tried an alternative to Terbinafine.

If you read the reports on the above site, you will see other 'side-effects' which are also not at all pleasant for those suffering them.       

An interesting piece of information here: http://www.accessdata.fda.gov/drugsatfda_docs/label/2012/022071s007lbl.pdf 
contains the following :    5.2 Taste Disturbance Including Loss of Taste 
"Taste disturbance, including taste loss, has been reported with the use of terbinafine. It can be severe enough to result in decreased food intake, weight loss, and depressive symptoms. Taste disturbance may resolve within several weeks after discontinuation of treatment, but may be prolonged (greater than one year), or may be permanent. If symptoms of a taste disturbance occur, Lamisil Oral Granules (Terbinafine base equivalent) should be discontinued."

You'll note that it states that "taste disturbance may resolve within several weeks [after discontinuation], but may be prolonged (greater than one year), or may be permanent".

Which is somewhat different from the patient advice leaflet (included with each box of tablets) which states, under Possible side-effects, "Uncommon (occur in less than 1in 100 people) -- Taste loss or altered taste which usually disappears when you stop taking these tablets. However, a very small number of people (less than 1 in 10,000) have reported the taste disturbance lasts for some time and as a result they they go off their food and lose weight". 

The inferrence in the latter is that the taste loss will be gernerally resolved (immediately?) upon stopping the tablets. And that 'taste disturbance' could in extreme cases last for some time. How long is some time?

Both these instances give no measurable definition of the time one will be without taste. I believe this failure to adequately specify even a minimum time period is a failure to warn patients (and doctors?) sufficiently for them to make an informed decision on whether or not to take (prescribe?) the drug.

Watch this space, folks.    

    


 

 







       

"... but on balance it'll be a plus." Bill Clinton, 2005, Hong Kong

Check out what Bill Clinton says from around 6 minutes in on this video - and then his follow up comment "You'll have all kinds of problems with them, but on balance it'll be a plus".

The reference would seem to alluded to aliens, and suggests that not only are they already here, but have been interacting with covert interests for long enough to establish that along with the benefits will come a trade-off. I wonder what we've traded off so far?    

 

Clinton's Speech in Hong Kong 14 Sep 2005

 

 

HMRC - only tackling the easy targets? Looks like it.

Multi-millionaire Paul Bloomfield paid no tax for 24 years - despite being 'checked out' by HMRC. So, what are we to make of this? Were HMRC incompetent or was Bloomfield just too much work to bother investigating properly over this 24 year period?
The truth of the matter is that HMRC would much rather come down hard on us, the easy targets. We have no where to go, no offshore accounts, no tax avoidance schemes, no option but to pay! You owe £100 they want it now! No excuses. Now! Or else they'll take you to task ... and add interest.
SO, MORE PROOF (AS IF WE NEEDED IT) OF ONE LAW FOR THE RICH AND POWERFUL, AND ANOTHER FOR US!

Tax evading tycoon not prosecuted

Tax inspectors failed to prosecute a property tycoon who did not submit returns or pay any tax for 24 years, documents seen by the BBC reveal.

bbc.co.uk

TERBINAFINE Tablets -- Tasteless? I should say so!

Back in December I was prescribed this tablet (one a day for 6 months) for a fungal toenail infection. Six weeks in I began to find my sense of taste diminishing. I couldn't work out what was happening at first, but then, by a process of illimination (and some online research), realised the tablet was probably the cause. I stopped taking it on Tuesday (10th Feb) by which time my ability to taste had disappeared completely and the back of my tongue felt like it was coated in plastic.
Everything I eat now tastes like salty, soggy cardboard - everything I drink (hot and cold) has no flavour. I spoke to my doctor and he seemed rather surprised that this could happen! However, he did say that he would no longer prescribe this particular medication. 
It seems there is nothing I can do about this taste loss other than spend the next seven to ten weeks waiting for it to return - hopefully in full. In the meantime, I don't feel like eating or drinking much. I force myself to have something, only because I know I need to, but the process holds no pleasure whatsoever. 
The leaflet in the tablet pack suggests that taste loss occurs in less than 1 person in 100 - then further suggests that in less than 1 in 10,000 the taste 'disturbance' lasts for 'some time' and as a result the person can 'go off their food and lose weight'. However, it doesn't say if the lab's results are based on results for the 125mg or the 250mg tablet - or what the 'some time' actually is. 
Either I have been unlucky in getting this reaction or the truth of the matter is that this taste loss is far more prevalent than the manufacturers would have us believe.  I will not be taking Terbinafine again and will be warning colleagues and friends about it. I have recorded it as a Yellow Card on the NHS yellow card site.      

A rite of political passage?

Politics, to use an Americanism, should be of the people for the people. However, it often seems to me that politics is of the hierarchy for the hierarchy, with the people left to scratch around looking for the crumbs from the lofty table of those who run the country.  

Now, you may think that I’m one of those who believe the world owes them a living. I don’t. I believe those who can work, should. However, there are those who, for whatever reason, can’t and we should help them to look after themselves, if they’re able – if not, then the country should have the wherewithal to do that for them.

Prospective Members of Parliament should have to know who ‘the people’ are. After all, it’s the public who these candidates are purporting to represent when they get into office – although, media reports have shown that there are many who forget that and see their appointment as a doorway to money, personal power and reciprocal favours. Of course, before voting, Joe (& Josephine) Public need to do their homework on who these candidates are and what they’re promising – not that there’s a great deal of difference between them at the ballot box, mainly because they’re all telling us what we want to hear – until they get into Parliament and then it’s a different story.

It’s true that Parliament needs a mixture of representatives in its ranks and maybe it’s asking too much for those who understand the machinations of Government to truly understand the plight of Joe Public. There will, of course, be some candidates who come from backgrounds which help them to empathise with those who don’t know where their next pound is coming from, whose accommodation is poor and who might be reliant on benefits to survive. But I feel these are few and far between. Often the ones who hit the headlines are the rich, many of whom it seems believe the definition of a poor person is someone who either had to win a scholarship to get to Eton, or might be down to their last quarter of a million pounds. It’s not the MPs fault, many of them have never had contact with the poor – why should they – they have had no need to.

Is it wrong to expect everyone we put in Government to have at least some semblance of what it’s like to be Mr and Mrs Public? No, it isn’t wrong. We should expect MPs to have a genuine  understanding of what it’s like to be without. After all, they never fail to tell us how important we are when they want us to vote, to pay taxes or to fight.

So, in the future, how do we get the people who want to represent us in Parliament to understand what it’s like to be Mr & Mrs Public? I'm sure any of you reading this will have your own ideas, but the one I suggest is to make sure every candidate has completed at least three months working unpaid for the homeless or disadvantaged. It should be a rite of passage before anyone can look to represent the people – no matter which party they favour.

 

 

 

 

Apostrophe catastrophe ...

I wonder why the apostrophe causes so much confusion and misuse?

 

It used to be the domain of the greengrocer (Carrot's - Banana's etc) and the occasional restaurant (Salad's - Pie's). Not forgetting of course the misuse of "it's" when the expression wasn't referring to "it is"  - as in  sign I saw a while ago advertising: "Food at it's best".

Nowadays, I see advertisements in newspapers for garage services, and on forecourt signs, offering MOT's.  

So who do we blame, the sign-writer or the person who commissioned him or her? Does anyone care? Will it eventually become an accepted form?  Or will it just become a new game - Spot the Misused Apostrophe.  

Or should I just get a life?

Global warming - a master class in dodging the question being asked.

Global warming - an open cheque?

http://goo.gl/LGG7p1