What is Lorazepam? The drug takes real risk from ‘The White Lotus’

Victoria Ratalife, the wife of the rich Financer on Season 3 of HBO’s “The White Lotus”, has a problem: she keeps popping pills.

And his choice medicine, anti-worry drug Lorazepam, has reduced him a little.

In the show, who follows guests holidaying guests at a fictional resort, Victoria pair her drug pair with alcohol, which shakes her on the dinner table. Sometimes she kills her words.

When she notices that her bullet supply is mysteriously decreasing, she asks her children if they are stealing them.

“Do you not have enough lorezepum to get a weeks in a wellness spa?” His daughter, piper, asks.

“The White Lotus” is not the only show to convenience these drugs recently. The new Max series “The Pitt”, which is in an emergency department, includes a story line about a benzodiazepine called Librium.

This is not a matter of taking Hollywood dramatic freedom. Benzodiazepines such as lorzepam and clordiazepoxide are notorious for extreme intoxication ability. They can also come with difficulty – sometimes deadly – symptoms of return.

The abuse of benzodiazepine drug characters is not uncommon, Dr. UC San Diego Health is a healing, Dr. Ian c. Neil said. “We definitely see that there is a lot in real life.”

And in recent years, he said, studies have shown that it is a major problem compared to doctors initially.

Widely misused collection of drugs

Drugs, often called benzos or downers, are commonly used to treat sleep disorders such as anxiety, terror attacks and restless leg syndromes. But they can also be used for other reasons, such as helping people manage the return of alcohol.

Other general benzodiazepines include diazepam (valium), clonazepam (clonopin) and alprazolam (zainax).

Unlike antidepressants, which may take weeks to start working, most benzodiazepines can provide relief within minutes – which can give rest to nervous flyers and others, which require quick concern relief for a specific condition. But if taken for a long period, patients can develop a tolerance within weeks of starting the drug, even when it was determined, Dr. Ludmila de Faria said, President of the Council on Women’s Mental Health of American Psychiatric Association.

“This is where people get into trouble,” he said, and started taking more medicine. “The same dose will no longer get rid of symptoms.”

Also, like drugs Clonzepam and diazepams live in the body for a long time compared to alprazolam. “People don’t realize this,” he said. “So they take several doses and it accumulates,” resulting in people “roams as they have some drinks.”

All these factors jointly misused drugs. According to US Food and Drug Administration, in 2019, the most recent figures, pharmacies destroyed the estimated 92 million benzodiazepine prescriptions. Research suggests that drugs are most frequently prescribed for adults between the ages of 50 and 64 years.

Delirium, falls and other risks

In 2020, the FDA updated the information given to all benzodiazepines and the information given to patients for all benzodiazepines to warn about physical dependence, withdrawal reactions, abuse and addiction risks.

Ideally, these dangers are explained to a patient, before they take their first pill. But this does not always happen. And even if a patient receives proper consultation, “It is one thing to say and then there is another thing to experience it,” Dr. Neil said.

He said that he often looks at patients who are already taking a cocktail of other drugs and do not understand the dangers of a combination of benzodiazepines, which are depressed, along with other drugs, with other drugs, which tamper with the sleep medicine or Benadril.

And if you are going to drink alcohol or use cannabis, it is best not to do any benzodiazepine in your system. When people add those substances that have depression, it can also interfere with their breathing.

Dr. The Jeriatric population treating indigo is particularly weak because benzodiazepines are metabolized in different ways, such as we have become dull in the body for a long time, for age. As a result, older people who take them may be more prone to fall or car accidents. Medications can also cause publish in patients who have dementia.

But drugs can be risky for people of any age, which is usually prescribed for a short time – usually for four weeks or less time – and they are considered a final way to treat the old position, Dr. Neil said.

A delicate withdrawal process

A 2019 study found that about 20 percent of people taking benzodiazepines misuse them. If one develops a dependence, it can be difficult to leave due to acute withdrawal symptoms.

Those symptoms may include stomach problems such as sleep disturbances, irritability, sweating, heartbeat, elevated blood pressure and dry asafoetida.

Closing the drug should be done in a soft way, ideally under the supervision of a doctor.

It is “almost like the landing of an airplane, where there is a gradual lineage,” Dr., a psychiatrist of the Beth Israel Decoce Medical Center in Boston. John Torus said.

While this is happening, he said, the patient can try various ways to help in managing the anxiety and talk to a physician about strategies.

In addition, there are other drugs such as clonidine, which can be used to treat anxiety and also help with any return symptoms.

In the end, it is always more effective to try to identify and address the root cause of anxiety, Dr. Taurus said. “Benzos are giving you rapid relief in the brain, but then one day closed – it is rapid relief.”