concerta and intuniv

Patricia - posted on 10/15/2012

I have a 12 year old son, he was taking straterra, but teachers complained about him not being focused, being tired, falling asleep in their class and being difficult when they would ask him to do work. So I took him too see his doctor. He prescribed 36mg of Concerta and 1 mg of Intuniv. I am sort of nervous, because last time we tried a stimulant, he anger was bad and made his behavior twice as bad, plus he had alot of headaches, lose of weight, irriblity and eye twitching. So I had him on straterra. Just a little nervous , tomorrow wil be his first day taking both. When , I get some imput I will let you know.

Miranda - posted on 04/11/2012

@ Jeanette Martin - Did you end up trying the Concerta & Intuniv? If so, what were your experiences with the combination. I have a 9 year old & we just maxed out of the Concerta, but had great luck with it at different doses for the last 3 1/2 years. Now it's just not working as well and I'm really considering adding Intuniv to give Concerta that extra boost it seems to need now. I'd love to hear your feedback on the combination! Thank you!

Jane - posted on 03/23/2011

My son takes Concerta and Guanfacine (one of ingredients of Intuniv). He takes two Concerta in the morning and one at midday, and he takes 1 Guanfacine three times a day. It seems to control his ADHD and ODD pretty well. Unfortunately he has developed a preference to self-sabotage and will flatly refuse to work some days so his grades are not what they should be. However, we haven't had meltdowns for quite a while.

Heather - posted on 03/23/2011

Hi..I've not had experience with these meds being prescribed together. Concerta is a stimulant med and intuniv is a non-stimulant. I have a very close friend who's daughter did not do well with stimulants but has had great success with the intuniv, with no side effect of not being able to eat. My 9 yo daughter is on her second stimulant trial run, she barely eats during the day and then was. Lot at night. She has also experienced trouble falling asleep with the stimulants. Our insurance will only cover an intuniv trial after two unsuccessful stimulant trials....at 58 lbs she is tiny and has now gone down to 55 lbs on the stimulant trials, so I'm hopeful that the intuniv will help her. So far I've not seen any change personality wise in my daughter, and she is very outgoing and personable as well!

Ellarel - posted on 03/20/2011

My son does not respond to stimulants that's why our doctor recommended intuniv. We have stopped all medications at the moment (Lord Help me) and are awaiting an appointment with another psychologist to discuss the possibility of asperger syndrome. When this medication was working it was amazing my son was paying attention in class listening and responding promptly and with no arguments. His tics were gone and he was remembering where he left his things. It was like I had my sweet little three year old back, a completely different child. But like all the other meds they slowly stopped working. My son did complain about the sensation of having to go to the bath room a lot. That went away the moment the medication was stopped. I hope you have better luck with this medication.

JEANETTE - posted on 03/18/2011

ok now my doc said to give it to him at night if he started getting sleepy in school and then once it got in is system bring it back to the morning time. did you guys try that and if so did that help or no? and was your son also taking concerta he is having to take both the intuniv is supoose to help make the concerta last longer but we will see he is taking it for the first time in the morning since its the weekend i wanted to see how he did on it before we tried it at school so i will repost after we see how he does thanks for you post tho.....

Ellarel - posted on 03/18/2011

My 7 year old son was on intuniv. At first it worked great and I had my sweet little boy back. But after the 1mg stopped working we increased the dosage to 2mg. We stopped the meds after he started to fall asleep in class. we would give it to him at 6:50 am with breakfast before school. When we would pick him up from school at 1:50 in the afternoon he was tired and would want to take a nap and sleep until the next morning. He was completely zapped of any energy.