Misc I have ADHD on 60mcgs Dexamfetamine daily does Dex make cortisol and affect the stress test for cortisol checking Adrenals ? Addisons

[LadyPascha]

Hi I'm new on here but from what I have seen so far you lot look much more clued up than the Endocrinologist I have been seeing,
I have ADHD and on 60mgs Dexamfetamine per day taken 2 x 30mgs, Last year I had my Cortisol levels checked and came back at the bottom of the range so I had a short synacthen test (stress test ) for cortisol and see how the adrenals are working as I have do have sones of Addison. anyway this test came back baseline 127 nmol which was below range but ignored this was after a 30mgs dose I stimmed to 499 nmol at 30 and then went down again and 60 mins
So Endo dismissed me and said everything ok. so in last year Ive been researching things and seen that Dex can cause Cushing's but not good evidence, and it also raised cortisol,
So my GP said I could do a test with double dose Dex and this came back at 437nmol and I felt good that day I wasn't struggling, so it appears Dex does make cortisol in me!
so back off to the endo who didn't believe me and said he would find out, and he can't find anything stating Dexamfetamine blunted cortisol. I told him I had seen research and the only time I had seen it blunted was in depressed people and he said nope its everyone and he's now kicked me off his books

feeling frustrated and also quite concerned about my life as if it is Addisons it could be fatal

Have any of you solid evidence papers that prove Cortisol is made by Dexamfetamine as I keep researching and google keeps giving me same stuff. I would like to report this dr for being an idiot and not listening to me, he also said if I wanted another test just to stop Dex for 24 hrs, I feel like sh*t when I stop it flu-like so don't want to do that..

if anyone can give me some evidence advice anything I would be very grateful
I have only had ADHD/ADD diagnoses for about ten years im an adult,
so does Dex affect ACTH synacthen cortisol stress test and if so in what way?
My GP gets it its just my thick endocrinologist who doesn't which is the one I need him to listen.
I am going to another but would like evidence in place so he can't ignore me

I hope you can understand what i am on about.. I now take my Dex 60mcgs in one go as feel better for it but die in the afternoon I take more other days and just put script in earlier to cover it

Thanks for reading my post

 

[Ds]

Hi @LadyPascha and welcome to Bluelight.

I am going to move this over to Other Drugs. Hopefully you will get the answer that you are looking for

 

[CFC]

Hi LadyPascha, welcome to Bluelight.

Sorry to hear you're having some health problems/concerns.

Rather than putting all this energy into trying to prove your specialist wrong - who clearly isn't convinced you have Addison's - you've been offered another stress test if you would stop taking your dex for a day. You should take him up on that offer, just to ease your mind that he's right.

Either way, I would try not to worry too much about this at the moment. If you do actually have the early stages of Addison's, eventually it will show up in blood markers and (eg) skin pigmentation. It isn't a silent disease and displays a myriad of very obvious markers over time. It would also take a long time to cause you any real harm as is rarely an acute issue.

 

[d1nach]

Is it possible 60 mg of amph is making you more anxious?

 

[LadyPascha]

Is it possible 60 mg of amph is making you more anxious?

I coukd do with a lot more it doesnt work

 

[xbandit07x]

It affects cortisol, but mostly Epinephrine and adrenaline norepinephrine and how they link up to other receptors.

 

[ĐmantuNJofra]

they link to dopamine, serotonin, norepinephrine transporters as they act as monoamines they mostly all go through dopamine pathways so yeah in healthy or ADHD persons they make you anxious at that dose and when you stop it abrubtly it causes those monoamines to break down in prefrontal cortex and hippotalamus (mostly dopamine)
that's why there is no cure for any type of amphetamine except excercising
when dopamine levels are higher than serotonin or adrenal it surely cause cortisol levels to go up

 

[LadyPascha]

they link to dopamine, serotonin, norepinephrine transporters as they act as monoamines they mostly all go through dopamine pathways so yeah in healthy or ADHD persons they make you anxious at that dose and when you stop it abruptly it causes those monoamines to break down in prefrontal cortex and hippotalamus (mostly dopamine)
that's why there is no cure for any type of amphetamine except excercising
when dopamine levels are higher than serotonin or adrenal it surely causes cortisol levels to go up

Never been anxious on Dex at all I am in fact non-functioning until I have some and get no effect till I have 60mgs then I feel just normal enough to get out of bed and sometimes that is not enough I need more I can get quite active and have what I would say is a normal day on around 100-120mgs which is probably not a high dose but never anxious on it, I probably need more but as its prescription, I only get 60mgs a day, so unless I can bare feeling like crap not having it a day or two 60mgs per day is all I get, not sure how much is high in these drugs towards street amp but DEX doesn't seem to give you a racy feeling , Lisdexamps did nothing for me that must be a genetic thing as they are a prodrug and I don't do well on any kind of prodrug. I did for years ramp it up with ephedrine but they banned that from uk so that, not an option now which that probably made cortisol so need to know another drug that can ramp Dex up so I can get motivated any suggestions?
Ephedra they have also banned in uk

So I have quite low baseline cortisol so maybe got a pituitary problem as when had synatchen test my Adrenals worked well so my problem could be at the pituitary not the Adrenals unless the Amp affects the ACTH Synatchen test,.
Thank you for this maybe I can teach the Endocrinologist a thing or two from all of you, bad they seem to not know a thing about it all so finding this forum has really helped me as you lot are much more knowledgable than 99% of those I think most only know type 2 diabetes so no good to me


I read on this forum somewhere that Dex 0.3mgs makes around 40-45 cortisol if thats the case I am running on dex cortisol and not my own scary thought as doubt CBG would keep me alive if I do have addisons disease. which my GP thinks i may have its just the ignorant Endos who don't seem to have an iota about Dex,
I know the PIL (Public Information Leaflet ) doesn't state this as a side effect in the UK but found it on an old PIL document in the FDA, I phoned up Takeda (formerly Shire pharmaceuticals to ask them why they have lost that vital side effect off their PIL and sent them the FDA document and they did send me a recent research paper stating that Lisdexamfetamine and dexamfetamine both increased plasma cortisol quite significantly!. although finding it hard to see how much cortisol it actually makes.
I had done a bit of my own research my morning 9 am cortisol has been borderline low and below range on 30mgs Dexamp and I did one cortisol test when i took 60mgs dex and it shot to 421nmol and I had a normal day, as to still feeling very lethargic, so I now take my dose all the in morning to just feel normal,
I have tried telling the Endos it makes Cortisol and cant can't get through to make them understand that it does make cortisol which is frustrating, but with what you have told e in this forum maybe I can get them to understand although wrong I have to teach them stuff they should know
Also, lots of kiddies on stimulants for ADHD and most make cortisol Im finding out, even Strata which is not a stimulant as such makes Cortisol even more than the amphetamine-based RX I wonder how many end up with Cushings,
or is it ADHD doesn't really exist and it's a low cortisol problem, I wouldn't put anything oast Pharma just trying to make drugs for a condition that doesn't exist, wasn't it in the late 80s they came up with the name ADHD ?
Saying that I would rather take dexamphetamine than rotten steroids that crumble bones, I So just need more dex to feel normal.and get my Cortisol levels up to a normal range

if Dex makes cortisol then surely that would be a treatment for low cortisol, although probably has its own set of problems it causes elsewhere at least doesn't make someone fat and bloated like steroids do
The biochemists in uk do not think Amp cause cortisol to raise it's quite unbelievable how little they know, I even found an article from 1969 which was published in the BMJ ( British Medical Journal ) that amphetamines raise cortisol in humans and also Growth hormone which mine is also a bit low and that's on Dex I found this info the other day after writing this post

It appears that most UK Drs and biochemists know nothing and all pretty ignorant and god damn dangerous that they know nothing about it as the PILs in Dex or the prodrug Vyvanse both don't state this on PIIL which is wrong and if they hide something like this on PILS makes me wonder WTF else they hide from the general public Im starting to think street drugs are safer than most Pharmaceuticals drugs
I have got a Pharmaceutical company Burka( formerly AKA Kindex) who make my dex who are going to do a case study on me as they didnt know it makes cortisol so am educating them as well haha , that is when I can actually get a specialist to see me as at the moment they all say that my cortisol is normal as was 421 that once so therefor can ot have adrenal insufficiency and as I am no medic they ignore that that result was on double my dose, Maybe I should make the pharmacutical company pay for me to see a private specialist I might find a decent Endo ten as the NHS ones know nothing.

Again thank you for info its very helpful and hopefully, if I can explain this to an Endo I can get to the bottom of it all.. Thank you sorry about rant I'm just a bit confused to why they dont make this info available its mad. thank god i discovered this site its very good

Could you tell me if the USA Dexamfetamine is better than the UK one asI am sure the UK get crap drugs, I get my liothyronine T3 for hypothyroid from USA Cytomel and that's much better I need much less of it than the UK ones that are all generics would it be worth my Doctor writing me a special prescription for Dexamphetamine as well?

 

[LadyPascha]

It affects cortisol, but mostly Epinephrine and adrenaline norepinephrine and how they link up to other receptors.

Thank you for this I need to educate the endocrinologists

 

[LadyPascha]

Hi LadyPascha, welcome to Bluelight.

Sorry to hear you're having some health problems/concerns.

Rather than putting all this energy into trying to prove your specialist wrong - who Clearly isn't convinced you have Addison's - you've been offered another stress test if you would stop taking your dex for a day. You should take him up on that offer, just to ease your mind that he's right.

Either way, I would try not to worry too much about this at the moment. If you do actually have the early stages of Addison's, eventually it will show up in blood markers and (eg) skin pigmentation. It isn't a silent disease and displays a myriad of very obvious markers over time. It would also take a long time to cause you any real harm as is rarely an acute issue.

I do have dark skin pigmentation on face and neck it comes and goes problem is Drs in the UK are taught very little on Addisons and think it is rare so will not diagnose you till nearly dead and don't seem to realise anything other than HRT oestrogen can affect Cortisol levels, which is ignorant the only thing I havent got is huge weight loss so until I am like a stick insect they probably will carry on being ignorant. I have a few other Autoimmune diseases so I wouldn't be surprised if I do have addisons as do have pernicious anaemia, gastric parietal cell antibodies, I had Graves so I'm sure my antibodies are destroying other things along the way as if you get one many can follow not that these Drs seem to know that I have lost all faith in any of the Doctors as they all seem useless, but if taught my Pharma what can we expect Pharma teach them to treat all symptoms as to treating the condition that way they make bigger $$$$$

I wonder if I have no weight loss because I am getting cortisol from Dexamfetamine,
I am not that worried tbh honest as when I feel sick i will just increase my Dex as it seem it work when I have flu like symptoms I, just one day it may not work till then I will carry on as I have been at least I have dex that makes me some cortisol so till I proper crash should be OK I think, Just hope they never take my Dex off me or can't get it as there is some shortage then I will worry.

Thanks for the advice much appreciated.
I have been told by an Addisons patient on a forum she had to come of Dex for 6 weeks to get diagnosed as messes with the HPA system she was given a drug called reboxetine which isn't an option for me I know I will be allergic to it, I cant do prodrugs of any kind as have many genetic problems in that pathway so will probably never get a diagnosis until nearly dead but that is not unusual for most with Addisons but am aware of it so I have half a chance as I now know if I get sick to get to the emergency dept ASAP