Singulair and negative side effects

About Singulair and being INCOMPATIBLE:

Merck acknowledges that there is a certain percentage of patients for which Singulair is "NOT EFFECTIVE" because of incompatibility issues. That problem is "all over" the research reports and clinical trials. Merck is even conducting research trials to try to determine why.

The issue of being incompatible as the reason for negative adverse side effects is not recognized as of now.

WHY? If Merck can recognize that Singulair is not effective or some patients, why doesn't it recognize that for others it causes negative side effects???

Please be sure to read the article and contact or email the following individual: Heather Grzelka
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I have invited her to review the Medications.com site and contact any parent to discuss the negative side effects that their children have suffered. The word needs to get out about the living nightmare that some families have endured all due to the pediatricians that are not aware of the adverse reactions to Singulair and continue to prescribe this drug.

Does anyone who has been having negative side effects ever feel like they have a fishy taste in their mouth, fishy body odor, or fishy breath? This is not related to fish oil of any kind but would be because of pyridine.

You probably ask "how does CC come up with these question?" I am trying to look for clues as to what happens to montelukast if it ionizes.

I was put on Singulair about 2 years ago because of my COPD. No allergies were ever mentioned by my Doctor. This site has been a god send for me.
Since starting Singulair I have been put on Digoxin for an irregular heart beat that I never had before. I have been put on Gabapentin for leg pain and cramping in my feet whenever I put my feet up or laid down to TRY and get to sleep. I have been put on so many pain killers for back pain, leg pain, neck pain I can't even count them all. I won't take them, they make me so sick. Now I find that I wake up with a headache every morning, feeling sick..oh yes, I was given medication for nausea also. And I don't want to forget the six months of experiencing never ending dizzy spells. That was another medication to ad to the list of ALL THE MEDICATIONS I HAVE TAKEN OVER THE PAST 2 YEARS for the side effects of Singulair. I stopped taking it a couple of days ago and I woke up this morning feeling so good. Oh, lets not forget the Xanax, Prozac and Cymbalta for depression.......OMG! I'm looking forward to see how many of these medications I can toss now that I've stopped taking Singulair. I just wish I had found this site two years ago, oh yeah, I am on Advair also. I've been, lets say "in a chronic bad mood" too. Some would say a "B". I've already noticed a difference there too.

I am posting this as a new post. I am not against Singulair. I am against withholding negative side effects from the patients. I am against promoting that Singulair is safe and effective for everybody on the planet.

My entire family is health care. My father was a surgeon. I worked for a pharmaceutical company. Pharmaceutical companies are supposed to ethically invent drugs and inform everybody about the safe and effective way to use those drugs. Pharmacists are supposed to police the prescriptions and dispense the correct dosage. Then pharmacists are supposed to be aware of side effects and drugs interactions. When necessary, pharmacist are supposed to intervene to prevent a mis- communication from turning into a disaster. Doctors are supposed to review the recommendations of pharmaceutical companies (who are policed by the FDA) in order to determine if their diagnosis matches the profile of drugs known to be therapies for certain symptoms. I, personally, am madder than hell at Merck. Singulair could really be a good therapy when it is needed. It could correct some bad stuff that happens short term. Why does Merck's need to make every drug a major block buster money maker ruin the market for Singulair?

While I do agree that research and public awareness of the possible side-effects should be done, there are some of us that take Singulair without negative side-effects. I have been taking it for eight years, since I was 16 and have never had any of these side-effects. There was a couple of months that I did not take it because of financial issues, and the only thing that I noticed was that my asthma and allergies were horribly worse. These were both relieved dramatically when I resumed taking it. Without it, I would spend my days in an allergy/anti-histamine fog not being able to breathe while still taking my inhaler 4+ times a day and several during the night. That is just the beauty and flawed nature of medicine: they work perfectly for some but for others the negative side effects outweigh the benefits. I am sorry that so many have had negative experiences with it themselves or in their family, but please have an objective attitude toward it. Some people need it to live normal lives.

Oh my gosh, I am just shocked after reading these posts. I am taking my son off of Singulair immediatedly!!!! I knew I wasn't crazy!! My son was on Singulair for over 2 years and it was awful. He was so hyper and uncontrollable. He couldn't control his temper. He had headaches everyday. He was put on it due to severe allergies and asthma. He is on other medications as well as allergy shots. I kept telling the doctor that I think the singulair was causing his bad behavior problems. He was just so hard to handle. He couldn't sit still for anything. The teacher couldn't get him to sit still in his chair. It just wasn't normal behavior for him. The teacher even thought he had ADD!! I didn't accept that however. The doctor just thought I was crazy and told me that Singulair wouldn't cause those symptoms. She said it actually would work opposit that and cause him to be sleepy. Well I took him off of it anyways and he did get pretty sick. His asthma acted up ect. But he eventually felt better and his behavior improved drastically. He wasn't so hyper and he could actually sleep at night and wasn't so scared at night. Just within the last week he has been pretty sick due to allergy season, his asthma has been bad and the doctor told me to put him back on the Singulair. So I did he has been on it for four days now and he is HORRIBLE.. It was an instant change. My husband and I can't control him and he can't sleep at night and has headaches every day. I am so glad I found this sight. I am taking him off immediately.
Thank you all so much for your comments. This medicine should be outlawed. I don't care what the doctors say. By the way my son is 9 years old. I certainly had no idea that it has caused suicide. I am so sorry to you all that have experienced such horrible things. Come to think of it my son used to say he hated himself all of the time when he was on this medicine.
God Bless You All

Thank you so much for all the information! My son was prescribed Singulair pills this fall. He has been taking them for seasonal allergies and we had no problems. These were the sample chewable kind. Then came the pills... Unfortunately I did not see the news or read the article about the side affects of Singulair. Within 4 days my happy well adjusted 10 year old had serious sleeping problems along with stomach aches. He will wake up screaming and crying and cannot tell me what is wrong. He said he had a nightmare but doesn't remember what it was about.

My husband was away on a business trip when I started him on the medicine. He came back to a very unhappy and sleepy child. I asked my son what he was scared of and he asked me to tell daddy that he does not feel safe while he is out of town. He can't sleep unless he is by one of us. He's not safe. His bedroom is 15' from our bedroom! He loves his doctor and begged that I call Dr. Becky so he can talk to her.

I could not take this anymore and started thinking about what was wrong. I went through all his activities, friends he's played with, school problems, anything! Then it hit me, effects of Singulair!

Wow, what an eye opener. Fortunately my husband did not have him take it this morning. He will not be going back to this medication. Ever!

Thank you for the information once again. I hope everyone's child gets better. Everyone wants a happy well child. No child should have to go through this. They have enough pressure as it is without the meds making things worse.

Maeri

My daughter is seven years old. She was diagnosed with asthma when she was around two years old and, for years, suffered with the night cough associated with childhood asthma.

When Singulair came along, my initial reaction was that of joy. My husband and I could not believe that we no longer heard coughing throughout the night. However, while on this drug, we also noticed that she underwent a change. Sometimes, she seemed terribly sad and withdrawn. Other times, she became angry and even aggressive. We rarely saw her smile. It also seemed like she was in some sort of fog much of the time. About a week ago, I found her on the floor of our office. She had just gotten out of the shower, and I was getting her pajamas for her. The towel was not around her and she was shaking violently and crying. She explained that she had the chills, but it was clear that she didn't even comprehend that her towel was not around her. We all know our kids, and, I'm telling you that this scene was frightening. This was not at all my daughter.

In addition to the mental/emotional changes, she also had physical symptoms including sudden and frequent headaches, fatique, stomach pain, and bed wetting. A day after her "breakdown" in our home office, my husband called me from work and told me that he had just been reading MSNBC and that there was an article about the negative side effects of Singulair. When he listed things that matched what our daughter had been going through since on this drug, it was both comforting and horrifying. I am relieved to know that there is nothing wrong with my daughter psychologically, but I am furious that she and so many others have been treated like guinea pigs. We took out daughter off Singulair the very same night that my husband came across the article on Singulair, and she hasn't had any of the mental or physical symptoms that she had been experiencing...the change was that drastic. Currently, we are only using her inhaler and Benadryl at night. She has a doctor's appointment next month, and I will tell the doctor about our experience.

I have my little girl back, but I can't help but wonder how many families are going through this and do not have a clue that Singulair could be the problem. Other than reporting this to our pediatrician, is their another agency I should contact?

Please report your negative side effects to: https://www.accessdata.fda.gov/scripts/medwatch/medwatch_online.cfm

If the FDA is launching an investigation then they need all the reports we can send them.

I posted early in 2007 that my daughter had become angry, violent, withdrawn, appeared to be hearing voices in her head, etc. Pediatrician dismissed Singulair link. Found this site and took her to a specialist and then took her off this horrible drug. She is doing much much better. It has not been an instant recovery, although we did see some changes immediately. This drug needs to be thoroughly investigated.

Hi I'm 20 years old and i've been on Singulair for at least 6 years (seems like forever) since i was about 14/15 (around the time i started Singulair!!!!) i have been developing severe anxiety. social anxiety, and just random panic attacks. for the past 1 1/2 years i have had at least 1 panic attack a day. Most of my days i am in a complete fog and cannot focus on anything, and seeing that i have a one year old to take care of this is NOT good. i just stopped taking the Singulair completely the day i heard the news about its negative side effects- so now I'm clutching to my inhaler all day just in case until i can get to my PCM to get a safer medication!

i am really shocked to hear this news about Singulair, i never would have considered that this could be causing my daily anxiety. It could be completely unrelated but i really hope this is at least a large portion of my issue since no medication other than tranquilizers have ever helped me.

After reading the recent news reports and reading other parents opinions on Singulair I thought I should be fair to the company, and to other parents seeking advice on this drug, to write about our POSITIVE experience with Singulair. Our 7 year old son was diagnosed with seasonal Asthma when he was 3. We have him on the Ventilator and Advair. During spring time allergy season he would begin wheezing and coughing on a regular basis. We would then give him his puffers. While it would relieve him of the wheezing he would be quite hyper and out of control. Therefore, our goal was to wean him off the puffers. We added Claritin to his diet each day. When he was 5 he struggled through his spring soccer season. As the months went by he looked tired, very sickly, and worn out. His coach recommended that we investigate Singulair. It really turned his child's life around! We talked to our doctor about it. She wasn't familiar with children using Singulair but she prescribed the 5mg chewable but recommended that he use both puffers before his soccer games. We followed her advice. He took his Singulair before bed and the puffers before the game. Sadly, we noticed that he was completely "out of it" during his games. He had no focus (not shocking for a 6 year old boy), no real interest in the game, and no energy. We just assumed it was because he was tired after a full day of school. One day we forgot his puffers but decided to let him play anyway. He had a great game. During a daytime tournament he was back to having his head in the clouds, so for the second game we decided to "forget" his puffers again. He played a great game. But best of all..no breathing problems. We decided to omit the puffers for the rest of the season and just use Singulair. It worked wonderful for him. None of the side effects that the other parents have described. We use it when spring begins and for the the first part of the fall season. He doesn't use it during the winter months. We are experiencing a real dry March so I started the Singulair on Tuesday. Then all of the negative comments came out. I certainly will not dismiss the concerns of the product. We are watching him closely to make sure there are no negative side effects. So far, so good. And no need for the puffers!

I see posts from people saying that they are not experiencing any negative side effects. That's wonderful--if you or your child can take this medication without any problems, go for it. Yes, the boards for other drugs do list extreme reactions, but if you look around, you won't find many with as many postings as this Singulair board has. I was shocked by how many postings there are here. And yes, this board had over 1000 posts even before the news story broke yesterday. I came here back in late February concerned only about my son's insomnia; only after reading the other posts did I realize that many of the other things I had been concerned (depression, fits of rage, exhaustion) could be linked to this drug.

If it works for you or your child, wonderful. Many people probably won't be affected at all by these negative side effects. But there are millions of people on Singulair. If only 10% have the serious side effects, that would be **hundreds of thousands of people**.

No side effects here - my 5 year old has been on Singulair since he was 2 1/2 and has showed no strange symptoms outside of those of a normal 5 year old boy. He has asthma and severe allergies - including a nut/peanut allergy. He also takes Zyrtec in the Spring and Summer seasons (heavy allergy time for him). Gets good grades in Kindergarten and has never had emotional/behavioral issues at school or at home. I am shocked to hear that people are having these extreme reactions! Although, it seems that there are always going to be reactions to ANY drug out there - go to any of the boards on any drug and you will find people with extreme reactions. Singulair has saved my sons lungs, and possibly his life.

I am 47-years-old and have been on Singulair and Zyrtec daily for at least 10 years. I have to say I have never had a single side effect or episode of depression from these drugs. I have a condition known as idiopathic anaphylaxis, and these drugs have been literally a "life saver" for me.

I am a 19 year old female who has taken Singulair for allergies for about 8 months. As I sit typing this, I am wearing a 24 hour Holter monitor to rule out any serious heart problems. I have been experiencing a high resting heart rate, feeling my heart pounding, fatigue, anxiety, irritability, and pains in my chest/upper back. I went to the ER on Dec 12 because my heart rate was so high, and they found no apparent cause for it, they said "Oh, no, it's fine to take the Singulair". I then followed up with my PCP and she said the same thing, "Yes, it's fine to keep taking it". She was testing me for hyperactive thyroid, and they did blood work that turned up nothing. I will hopefully get the results of the Holter this week and I am hoping they will be clear. I believe that my symptoms are from the Singulair and last night was my last dose. I feel relieved to hear others experiencing these same symptoms, as I was starting to become anxious that I had a very serious or permanent illness. I will update after I am off the Singulair for a while.

My daughter is 5 years old and has been on singulair for 1 week. i have already noticed a dramatic change in her behavior. she has become irritable, mean, nasty, and emotional. she has had me in tears on a daily basis. she has turned into a monster. we will be calling the doctor in the morning!

Update after stopping Singulair. I stopped taking the drug on March 7th due to sleep disturbances (vivid dreams), depression (constant impending doom and thoughts of death), gastrointestinal disturbance - diarrhea, cramping on lower left side, general IBS symptoms. Following discontinuance, the depression has lessened, not currently to the point where I am the same person as I was (never suffered depression). Sleep has returned to normal, but find days when I become very tired after 5 hours and still go to bed early. This is not every day, some days cannot sleep, others are easy. GI problems became moreso after stopping. Went to the doctor who is doing a colonoscopy next week, I am overdue but the cramping, indigestion and roving abdominal pain bacame worse the first week following cessation and are now subsiding.

I wish I were one of the majority who could take this drug, but unfortunatly am not. Hopefully all negative side effects will be gone in the next few weeks, just hard to believe it did so much to me.

i have been on singular for a couple of months. i am older and exercise regularly. my stomach started to get bloated despite my increase in exercise and decrease in food intake. Also i had ear pain and occasional headaches. The heart attack type symptoms I had which initially prompted the use of Singular for my asthma, still continue. I have always been asthmatic and this medication has done nothing positive and alot of negative side effects.

I read everyones posts above and have the opposite comment regarding my child. He is three years old and has been on Singulair for about five days now for chronic sinus infections. He is typically a moster, very difficult to deal with, very negative, etc - similar to the negative side effects listed by parents whose children are on Singulair. Since he's been on the medication, he has been very cooperative, happy, ready to learn new things, etc - a complete opposite of what he was pre-medication. He has also been sleeping very well and deeply through the night. I searched the internet trying to find alternate uses for Singulair and haven't found any. Has anyone else experienced this? I wonder if there's a sort of anti-depressant or mood elevating component to it?