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“We would like to tell Congress how dangerous [Paxil] is and how it almost ruined our lives.”
Dear ICFDA,
I am writing to tell you that my husband and I would like to testify before Congress on the side-effects of Paxil and what happened to our daughter, Devin, who was nine years old when it was prescribed for her.
Devin is a twin and she and her sister were going into fourth grade during the summer of 2002. Devin was one of the brightest, most creative students, popular with classmates and teachers. She was a happy, gentle, caring child who kept her feelings to herself. She was always smiling.
Toward the end of the summer of 2002 I began to notice a change in Devin. She was exercising excessively, running nonstop, swimming underwater for long periods. And she had also stopped eating certain foods.
By October, she had lost a good deal of weight and was acting in a bizarre way. We didn't know who she was anymore.
We took her to see an eating disorder specialist in Boston. He saw her once and on the second visit he prescribed Zoloft. He said that he couldn't tell if Devin had OCD or an eating disorder.
She was on Zoloft for two weeks and didn't tolerate it well. She was manic.
So he switched her to Paxil, 10mgs.
By November 7th, she was finally hospitalized at our insistence. She had lost 10 pounds and she was definitely more manic at this point. She couldn't stop jumping or exercising.
She was admitted to Massachusetts General Hospital for one month on a heart monitor. She had developed cardiac arrhythmia and her HR went as low as 26 and as high as in the 140's. A normal HR for a nine year old child is around 60.
During her hospital stay she was given an increase of Paxil and started on Risperdal for one day. Her tongue was swollen so Risperdal was discontinued after that one day.
She was then changed to Zyprexa, along with Paxil.
By January Devin was on 30mgs. of Paxil and 10mgs. of Zyprexa.
This gentle child had now become a violent person that we did not know.
She was abusive to herself, to my husband and myself, and she was suicidal.
One day I found her trying to jump out of her second floor bedroom window.
She had one leg out the window when I came into her room.
Another time she ran out one night into the snow with only her underwear on. It was below freezing that night and she hid in a neighbor's yard.
Many times she would run to the silverware drawer, take out a knife, and attempt to stab herself. One time she actually cut her arm with a broken CD.
She would continuously hit her legs so that they became black and blue.
She was out of control most times. Often it took both my husband and myself to hold her down so that she would not hurt herself. Still, she managed to bite, scratch, kick and punch us. Many times we would have cuts on our faces and bruises on our bodies.
We could no longer do the things that we used to do as a family.
I pleaded with her doctor that the medications were doing this to her. He refused to believe me. He told me that she was fine, that this only happened at home so that home must be the problem.
It got so bad and we were getting very worried for her that finally, in May of 2003, I sent her doctor an email demanding that she be taken off all meds.
When I saw him a few days later he told me not to come back unless my husband was with me. So basically he threw me out.
Before this, he had set up a consult with the head of the OCD Department at Mass General who is also a pharmacologist.
This new doctor started to withdraw Devin from the Paxil first, then Zyprexa. But he had her start on Depakote first in order to stabilize her mood.
At times it seemed like the withdrawal was as bad as when she was on the full amount of the medication. We withdrew her very slowly, from June until September.
She was given acupressure each week, sometimes several times a week, to help her with the symptoms of withdrawal.
Devin still has many behavior issues and relapses into problems with eating from time to time. We are still trying to find out what happened to her.
But she no longer is violent or suicidal.
We are positive that what she went through was severe side effects from Paxil.
In July we found out from a friend about the Health Advisory Warning against Paxil from the FDA.
Devin's doctors never told us about this.
I sent a complaint to the FDA in July outlining our experience with this medication.
We would like to tell Congress how dangerous this drug is and how it almost ruined our lives.
Thank you,
Marion J. Goff and Dennis Karambelas
Parents of Devin Karambelas
Karambelas03@aol.com
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