• Perceived effectiveness for Muscle spasms: Major
• Side Effects: Moderate
• Adherence: Sometimes
• Burden: Somewhat

Dosage: 50 mg Daily

Advice & Tips: I started taking this as a treatment for Muscle Spazms on the whole right side of my body during my second MS attack. It worked almost with the first dose, within a week I was no longer having Muscle Spazms at all, and within 3 weeks I was able to wean the dose down to half tab a day, then I discontinued completely. I now keep a bottle handy in case I have another attack, but so far I have not needed it.

Cost: $25-49 monthly

Side effects: Brain fog

• Perceived effectiveness for Epilepsy: Slight
• Side Effects: Severe
• Adherence: Always
• Burden: A little

Dosage: 600 mg Daily

Cost: $25-49 monthly

• Perceived effectiveness for Nerve pain (neuralgia): Moderate
• Side Effects: Moderate
• Adherence: Always
• Burden: Not at all

Dosage: 800 mg Daily

Advice & Tips: Take medication as prescribed. If you need to stop medication make sure you wean yourself off of the drug according to your doctor due to causing very severe side effects including seizures.

Cost: < $25 monthly

Side effects: Increased appetite, Mood swings, Dizziness

• Perceived effectiveness for Epilepsy: Moderate
• Side Effects: Severe
• Adherence: Always
• Burden: Very

Dosage: 400 mg Daily

• Perceived effectiveness for Epilepsy: Major
• Side Effects: None
• Adherence: Always
• Burden: Not at all

Advice & Tips: It worked very well for a long time. At my request, under my doctor's care, I stopped taking it to see if I could do without medicine for my epilepsy. I could not. He put me back on the tegretol, but I became toxic on it at any dose.

Cost: < $25 monthly

• Perceived effectiveness for Other: Moderate
• Side Effects: Moderate
• Adherence: Usually
• Burden: A little

Side effects: Hiccups (hiccoughs)

• Perceived effectiveness for Other: Moderate
• Side Effects: Moderate
• Adherence: Sometimes
• Burden: Not at all

Side effects: Hiccups (hiccoughs)

• Perceived effectiveness for Epilepsy: Can’t tell
• Side Effects: Severe
• Adherence: Always
• Burden: A little

Dosage: 1200 mg Daily

Advice & Tips: 1) If you request a surgical evaluation and the doctor (in my case, Robert Gumnit, M.D.) refuses to let you out of the hospital forcing you to take more medication, get off of it if you can still think. If you cannot think another person will have to get you off of it and file a lawsuit in less than two years for you to have a chance to have a regular life again. 2) Over twenty percent of mothers I have talked with believe that "doctors know everything" and will not help their children survive. (And about 7000 deaths each year in the 1990s were due to a doctor killing a patient.) Make sure the person watching over you when you try a new medication will take action and not leave you a "zombie" (a nurse who told me I was within two days of death and my Dilantin count was up to 36.6 while getting off of Tegretol following the doctor's orders. 3) When I used over 500 mg/day of Tegretol, I could not think at all. When I got under 200 mg/day, then I regained control of my life. It was three years after my right hip shattered that I learned the Tegretol did that.

Side effects: Difficulty thinking

• Perceived effectiveness for MS (Multiple Sclerosis): Can’t tell
• Side Effects: Severe
• Adherence: Always
• Burden: A little

Dosage: 100 mg Daily

Advice & Tips: severe allergic reaction. blisters under the skin on every part of my body. needed i.v. steroids to recover

• Perceived effectiveness for Epilepsy: Slight
• Side Effects: Severe
• Adherence: Never
• Burden: Not at all

Dosage: 100 mg Daily