Prescription Meds and so forth

[lucidaisy]

My apologies if someone has posted this, but I couldn't find it and wanted to know more about gluten in meds and see how we can help others- potentially save everyone from the long searches of looking things up themselves.

Has anyone else noticed how ridiculously difficult it is to find out if gluten is in a medication? Being newly diagnosed, I have found myself going through the ringer analizing medical ingradients and frustrated at how many things aren't listed, like the caplets, coatings, film. Ofcourse, there's also the legal cop-out of "We Cannot Guarantee that this product doesn't contain gluten and/or has been contaminated with gluten. Yaaaayyyy...thanks for the care companies.

One of these fun pills is Nexium. Now, this one in "The Gluten-Free Bible" says it is not gluten free, but I have noticed some of the pills listed are not correctly listed and it's five years after publication, so things change. Nexium's tagline should be changed to "the little purle pain in the a**", because it is one of the lovely friends of the legally opted-out brands, as in they aren't quite sure about gluten and aren't going to let you blame them if you have a reaction by it being mysteriously contaminated. Maybe they and Outback should join forces.

Here's one of question: Levaquin. One of the most insanely difficult brands (including all of the Fluoroquinolone types) to pinpoint all of the ingredients. This is one of those that mysteriously has a film coating that is not identified. I had an allergic reaction to this. Now, this could be me, because I am allergic to almost everything, including other medications. Regardless, has anyone found out about these pills?

Also, I have to completely disagree with "The Gluten Free Bible" 's suggestions that if you are in the hospital and don't know which antibodies may or may not contain gluten and they have to give you something, to take the medication intravenously. I'm sorry, but No, no no no no! More people, including those without any allergies can have more extreme allergic reactions from compounded medications that are made to enter by intravenous means. So what does this mean for people with actual allergies, sensitivities, intolerances...yadda yadda, mean- we WILL have a much worse reaction this way and I have experienced this, too. I would suggest, which you probably already do, finding which medications work, which main ingredients you have allergy to (i.e.: gluten, penicillin, glutonous starch from wheat, whatever else you individually may have, etc.), and what you take regularly and print it out, laminate it and keep it with you at all times. Maybe even purchase a medical alert bracelet, red cross alert tatoo, or ???, so if you are alone and taken to the hospital unconscious, they will know to look in your things for it. I believe any steps you can or want to take to help yourself out of compromising situations with your health, go for it.

Ok. kindof veered off topic a bit, but does anyone else have medicines they'd like to help us out with, tips, etc. that would be wonderful!

Thanks

[lucidaisy]

whoops- I mispell- my bad