Experience with Intuniv (guanfacine)?

[Anonymous]

My 12 year old son is on 36mg Concerta and 1mg Intunive. He gets good grades and was doing well when the pharmacy gave him Guanfacine instead of Intunive (which they said was the same medicine, but the generic), so continued on with the Guanfacine and I began noticing his anxiety was higher than normal. (I did not think about the change from Intunive to Guanfacine, because they said they were the same). I thought his rise in anxiety was due only to starting the 6th grade, and all the different classes, new kids, hurrying from class to class, and the fact that he had two teachers who were sarcastic and intimidating and mean. And my son is sensitive as it is, like most ADHD kids. He began to hate going to school, and began having panic attacks. After doing some more research on the web site "ADDitude", I found out that many people have taken Guanfacine and then when going to a new Dr., they were given Intunive because the Dr. Thought it worked better! I am pretty sure he is right , (in my son's case anyway). I found out that if the Dr. wants the patient to have the Intunive, they have to write that on the prescription so that the insurance company doesn't make the pharmacy give the generic instead. We did go to the school and have a parent /teacher/school counselor, meeting to let them know just what we thought of the sarcastic remarks and embarrassing and intimidating my son, (and other students too from what my son said).
Intunive works on "Emotional Sensitivity", the Guanfacine was not doing the same thing! So don't believe it if they say, they are the same thing! They are not, if they were the insurance companies would care about paying for the name brand because their wouldn't be a difference in price.....but their is! Beware!

Good Luck and God Bless!
TakeAStand, NH

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My 12 year old son is on 36mg Concerta and 1mg Intunive. He gets good grades and was doing well when the pharmacy gave him Guanfacine instead of Intunive (which they said was the same medicine, but the generic), so continued on with the Guanfacine and I began noticing his anxiety was higher than normal. (I did not think about the change from Intunive to Guanfacine, because they said they were the same). I thought his rise in anxiety was due only to starting the 6th grade, and all the different classes, new kids, hurrying from class to class, and the fact that he had two teachers who were sarcastic and intimidating and mean. And my son is sensitive as it is, like most ADHD kids. He began to hate going to school, and began having panic attacks. After doing some more research on the web site "ADDitude", I found out that many people have taken Guanfacine and then when going to a new Dr., they were given Intunive because the Dr. Thought it worked better! I am pretty sure he is right , (in my son's case anyway). I found out that if the Dr. wants the patient to have the Intunive, they have to write that on the prescription so that the insurance company doesn't make the pharmacy give the generic instead. We did go to the school and have a parent /teacher/school counselor, meeting to let them know just what we thought of the sarcastic remarks and embarrassing and intimidating my son, (and other students too from what my son said).
Intunive works on "Emotional Sensitivity", the Guanfacine was not doing the same thing! So don't believe it if they say, they are the same thing! They are not, if they were the insurance companies would care about paying for the name brand because their wouldn't be a difference in price.....but their is! Beware!

Good Luck and God Bless!
TakeAStand, NH

It is only in the past few months that there has been a generic version of Intuniv. That explains why the cost of our son's prescription just went down substantially!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My 12 year old son is on 36mg Concerta and 1mg Intunive. He gets good grades and was doing well when the pharmacy gave him Guanfacine instead of Intunive (which they said was the same medicine, but the generic), so continued on with the Guanfacine and I began noticing his anxiety was higher than normal. (I did not think about the change from Intunive to Guanfacine, because they said they were the same). I thought his rise in anxiety was due only to starting the 6th grade, and all the different classes, new kids, hurrying from class to class, and the fact that he had two teachers who were sarcastic and intimidating and mean. And my son is sensitive as it is, like most ADHD kids. He began to hate going to school, and began having panic attacks. After doing some more research on the web site "ADDitude", I found out that many people have taken Guanfacine and then when going to a new Dr., they were given Intunive because the Dr. Thought it worked better! I am pretty sure he is right , (in my son's case anyway). I found out that if the Dr. wants the patient to have the Intunive, they have to write that on the prescription so that the insurance company doesn't make the pharmacy give the generic instead. We did go to the school and have a parent /teacher/school counselor, meeting to let them know just what we thought of the sarcastic remarks and embarrassing and intimidating my son, (and other students too from what my son said).
Intunive works on "Emotional Sensitivity", the Guanfacine was not doing the same thing! So don't believe it if they say, they are the same thing! They are not, if they were the insurance companies would care about paying for the name brand because their wouldn't be a difference in price.....but their is! Beware!

Good Luck and God Bless!
TakeAStand, NH

It is only in the past few months that there has been a generic version of Intuniv. That explains why the cost of our son's prescription just went down substantially!

PP again. It looks like the generic form only comes in 1-2 mg dosages. Our DS takes 3 mg.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP here. Thanks for the feedback. It seems like the guanfacine would be a good thing to try and we absolutely would consider the short acting dose. We're seeing Dr. Conlon on Tuesday (we saw the regular pediatrician yesterday - he's also good and knew we'd be seeing Dr. Conlon soon) and will ask him about it. Thanks again!

Off topic. Is Dr. Co?noon back in private practice. We were very disappointed when he closed his prior practice and went to Kaiser, it think?

[Anonymous]

My 7 year old daughter was prescribed several drugs for ADHD, Vyvanse and most recently Intuniv. After nearly a month of night terrors and animated dreaming we pulled her off Intuniv and have immediately seen improved, restful sleeping. I can’t tell you how devastating it was to see her in an inconsolable dreamlike haze lasting from 45 minutes to several hours. Her terrors consisted of things crawling on walls and macabre events, something I truly found odd as we heavily monitor her television/news/etc.l intake. Thankfully we’re all getting some rest now and can tackle the day with clarity. Intuniv may work for other but it was a nightmare of a drug for us.

[Anonymous]

The sleep issues are really bad for us too. It’s pretty common.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The sleep issues are really bad for us too. It’s pretty common.

That's too bad. Intuniv has been wonderful for my DS. Amazing how one drug can be so different for different people.

[Anonymous]

Our 10-year-old daughter tried a brief trial as the stimulants were not having enough effect at a low dose and too many side effects when they were increased. Guanfacine wasn't a great option for us either, sadly. She took it at night and even at a fairly low dose it was causing her to fall asleep during the daytime. She also developed terrible constipation. I think some kids (like ours) just don't respond very well to medication or need to have a fairly complicated combination of doses for it to work. Still trying...

[Anonymous]

intuniv added some benefit in combo with a stimulant for DS(7), but caused terrible weepiness. In october, the teacher said he was doing great and they were working on his crying. I said, "crying"??? Yes, apparently he cries about minor things 3 or 4 times a day - wrong line for lunch, took too long to eat his snack, didn't get to finish his art, etc. Teacher said it was not abnormal for his age and nothing to worry about. I said, "my son has literally never cried about anything in his life - he is so easy going". I checked with the teacher from last year -- can't remember a single time he cried the whole school year. Stopped the intuniv. No more crying. Poor kid spent 4 months so sad, and we never even knew about it....

[Anonymous]

Intuniv (DS9 taking the generic) has been helpful for us, in combo with SSRI. (We tried it a couple of years ago pre-SSRI and saw the weepiness described by others.) He has to take it right after school - for some reason, that's the time that works for him. Either evening or morning timing seems to prompt night waking. We have not had issues with night terrors, thankfully.

It has made a big difference in managing impulsivity and irritability/agitation.

[Anonymous]

DC recently started 1 mg of Guanfacine for ADHD (very negative experiences with 2 different stimulant classes) at night and after taking if for a week, like clockwork, seems to have nightmares which entail babbling in sleep, standing in room, etc after about 1.5 - 2 hours of sleep. DC settles quickly when I go into room (immediately upon hearing crying/babbling) and lie next to her in bed and then sleeps through night.

After 2 weeks, we increased the dose to 1 mg at night and 1 mg in morning and the nightmares seem more vivid.

It seems others' children have also experienced these nightmares/night terrors. Does changing the full dose to the morning or afternoon seem to help this go away?

Have others' children had this experience with clonidine?

The Guanfacine does seem to be reducing impulsive behavior issues. Thanks for sharing your experiences.

[Anonymous]

My DS started having trouble sleeping at night (could not fall asleep!) so we switched his full dose (only 1 mg.) to morning and that has helped. I’m thinking switching full dose to morning may help in your situation.

[Anonymous]

As a mental health professional it bothers me to see people arguing over Intuniv and Tenex when both are the same exact drug with the same exact mechanism aside from one being immediate release and one being extended release. They are interchangeable.

[Anonymous]

I disagree. They are not interchangeable if one is extended release and one is not.

[Anonymous]

Anyone see increased energy with the first dose? I was surprised there wasn't any sign of tiredness, etc.