by NuWaveRx » Fri May 05, 2006 11:12 am
The effects of drugs like ambien on sleep architechture can vary dramatically. In March of this year several reports of bizarre behavior in people using ambien was reported in the lay media. This included "sleep driving" as well as "sleep eating". Previous this was only common in patients who misused, took other drugs or alcohol, or abused the drug. The report below is from Medscape:
Driving, Other Erratic Behaviors Reported After Taking Zolpidem
Laurie Barclay, MD
March 24, 2006 — Zolpidem (Ambien), a nonbenzodiazepine, sedative-hypnotic prescribed for the short-term treatment of insomnia, has been associated with increased numbers of impaired driving incidents in Wisconsin during the past several years. Although the label directs patients to take zolpidem only when able to devote a full 8 hours to sleep, and cautions against operating heavy machinery or motor vehicles, the patients involved in these incidents have driven while under the influence of zolpidem. Some of these drivers have expressed their belief that they were "sleep-driving," saying they have no memory of the driving incident.
"A 'typical' Ambien driver will demonstrate erratic, unsafe driving, often with wide lane deviations, many crashes or near–head on collisions, or unpredictable, bizarre driving maneuvers," Laura J. Liddicoat, BS, supervisor of the Toxicology Section at the Wisconsin State Laboratory of Hygiene (WSLH) in Madison, told Medscape. "Their physical symptoms include a profound loss of balance, so pronounced that the standardized field sobriety tests, such as the walk-and-turn and one-leg-stand, are usually discontinued for fear that the subjects will fall or otherwise harm themselves. Cognitive abilities are greatly reduced; subjects are often confused, disoriented, have a slow, delayed response and reduced short-term memory as displayed by needing instructions repeated numerous times and not recalling recent driving events."
At the 58th annual meeting of the American Academy of Forensic Sciences on February 28, Ms. Liddicoat discussed 6 cases of impaired driving related to zolpidem. These cases were identified from drivers stopped for impaired driving with alcohol concentrations below 0.10 g/100 mL, which is the testing protocol at WSLH. Blood levels of zolpidem in these drivers ranged from 190 to 4440 ng/mL. The peak of a single dose of zolpidem is about 110 to 115 ng/mL, according to the drug's package insert. Drivers with a level of 190 ng/mL had 3 or 4 other drugs detected.