Restless Legs Syndrome (RLS) Discussion Board

Monday, February 26 Welcome to CalmLegsJL, who is looking to learn more about RLS and is interested in natural remedies. You can find quite a bit about non-prescription treatments for RLS in our forum on Non-Prescription Meds, Supplements, etc. Unfortunately, most natural treatments are not very eff...

When you ask your doctor to check your iron levels, be sure to ask to have your ferritin checked too. Ferritin is not part of the normal blood iron test and is the most important iron criteria for RLS. Further, when you get the results, don't accept a report of "Normal", be sure to the the number. T...

One of the requirements to become and RLS QCC is that they must be prepared to prescribe opioids for refractory RLS. The medications that they listed are consistent with the current recommendations, namely iron first followed by gabapentin/Horizant/Lyrica with dopamanergics after that. They probably...

In addition to the RLS management document that the link in my signature points to, you might also share this document with your doctor. It explains why opioids are required to treat "refractory" RLS, which is what we have after augmentation. https://www.mayoclinicproceedings.org/article/S0025-6196(...

You can also try soaking your legs in very hot water when this happens. For most of us, it immediately calms your legs and the RLS doesn't return for about 20 minutes, which is usually enough to allow you to fall asleep if you go to bed immediately after drying your legs.

Saturday, February 24 Welcome to dodieoncrystal, whose son has had RLS since he was in his 30's and is now 59. He's been subscribed all effective medicines - They work for a few years then no more. ..even prescribed opoids - They work but cannot be forever. He has very severe pain, loses many nights...

Sorry, but I don't remember the key words to use to find the publications. There were only one or two, but that may be buried in our Research papers folder. It was several years back. As I remember, the publication spoke about how change occurred to the brain's structure due to dopamanergic augmenta...

Nan, every neurologist that I have seen, including the one who was clueless about everything, has relied upon discussion during appointments. When I first saw my current neuro, we talked about various treatment option for about an hour because I was highly augmented at the time. I proposed methadone...

You can change the font size on most Windows pages by holding down the CTRL key and hitting the + key. Hitting the "-" key makes the font go down.

Sleepdancer, there were a couple of research papers published about five years ago where they concluded that augmentation produces changes to the brain's structure that are permanent. Virtually all meds cause side effects and usually when one occurs, the doctor says that the side effect will go away...

I used to frequently travel internationally and so I received just about every vaccine given. Fortunately for me, anthrax wasn't on the long list of things that I was given. I was in the Gulf for many years before the first involvement of the US and can say that there was a great deal of pollution a...

Sounds like you had a great time. We did four weeks cruising across the South Pacific a few years ago. I spent a lot of nights out walking the decks or the passage ways, so I got to know most of the crew by the time we finally got to South America. Thankfully, our flight home didn't cause me any pro...

Monday, February 19 Welcome to janewolf, whose RLS has changed her life. She was diagnosed 17 years ago and is trying to figure out her augmentation. You can learn about augmentation from our Augmentation form or from reading the document that the link in my signature points to. And if you need an o...

It is very safe to take gabapentin at the same time as pramipexole. In fact, many of us have been taking both of them for years. Further, the experts prefer to use gabapentin to treat RLS over pramipexole or ropinerole these days. Yes, there can be some side effects of gabapentin, but it is used to ...

Sunday, February 18 Welcome to suza, who doesn't have a life anymore when evening comes. She can't sit down and relax without taking a xanax and that knocks her out. Xanax is not an appropriate treatment for RLS. You need to be treated for RLS and not just insomnia. Has your doctor checked your seru...