Is citalopram stronger than sertraline?

[PampersAndHuggiesMe]

Have been on sertraline for 3 years but its just not been working for me,

I was on 50g and when it stopped working for me they put me up to 100mg sertraline,

It still wasn't do anything for me so today my GP put me onto citralopram,

I just opened the bag and its only 10mg.

Is it stronger?, from 50/100mg to 10mg seems a big drop? Or is it because its more potent anyways?

[PampersAndHuggiesMe]

x

[ReallyTired]

Treating depression with drugs is a little bit of guess work. Different drugs affect the brain chemistry in different ways. It is impossible at the moment for a GP to know which part of brain mechanism for keeping us happy has gone wrong at the moment. There is no one size fits all approach to medication or theraphy as depression is a wide spectrum of illnesses.

There are other anti depressants other than ssri antidepressants. Prehaps if you have been depressed for three years it would be worth asking for a referal to a pychiarist to review your meds.

[Madamelashrink]

Citalopram and sertraline are from the same class of antidepressants. If you responded to sertraline for a while and didn't experience too many side effects it makes good sense to try another antidepressant from the same class. You can't compare them in terms of strength from the dose alone. the starting dose for sertraline is 50mg. The starting dose for citalopram is either 10mg (where anxiety is a predominant symptom) or 20mg. Often people find citalopram more effective than sertraline, but it has more worse side effects. That is probably the reason you've been started on the lower starting dose.

[HappySnail]

Don't know the fancy mg stuff, but I know that Citalopram works for me after having been on Sertraline for years, so give it a try! :)