4 ms·

I have little sympathy for people thinking "oh, it's safe, so it must be safe to take more than the maximum recommended safe dose", but that might be partially

I have little sympathy for people thinking "oh, it's safe, so it must be safe to take more than the maximum recommended safe dose", but that might be partially because I'm married to a nurse. If I try to be a little more objective about it, I suppose its sensible given how prevalent the drug is and how little you ever hear about people having problems with it- you wouldn't really assume that overdosing would be that dangerous. When your pain is bad, it is tempting to just keep taking more drugs until it starts working, and everyone knows (er... everyone I know; again, probably biased 'cause married to a nurse) you're not supposed to take too much ibuprofen 'cause it's bad for your stomach, so might as well take tylenol. Fortunately, one of the genuine good features of acetaminophen is a lack of negative interactions with other drugs, so the safe way (as far as I know / have experienced, not a medical professional, don't take my advice, etc., etc.) to assuage that temptation is to vary the types of painkillers you use- little bit of ibuprofen, little bit of tylenol, and unless it gets really bad (at which point you should probably be seeing a doctor and not self-medicating anyway), that generally keeps you within safe limits for both (if you wanna add more types to the rotation, though, you do have to do some research and make sure that the additions don't cause bad interactions or have similar mixtures of active ingredients; e.g., if you take Aleve, that counts towards your total ibuprofen dosage limits).

x0x0 13y ago
Wow. But let's play along. Which other OTC medicines could being forgetful and accidentally taking a second dose cause death? Not to mention it's hidden in other medications which require careful label reading to discover. fta: "The 4 gram per day recommended dose is also the maximum safe dose, one that must not be exceeded, an unusual situation for any drug, particularly an OTC drug, one placing a large fraction of users close to a toxic dose in the ordinary course of use," the report said. that sounds like something extraordinarily dangerous to be handing out OTC and allowing companies to bury in other medications requiring people to be very careful to not accidentally double dose.
- nknighthb 13y ago
  Where did you get the idea that an extra 1g dose can be fatal? "Maximum safe dose" does not mean "exceeding this dose once is fatal".
cmccabe 13y ago
I don't subscribe to the belief that people deserve to die for not doing exhaustive research on the over-the-counter medications they take. You might want to rethink your position, since you apparently didn't do enough research yourself when you said that acetaminophen has "a lack of negative interactions with other drugs." Acetaminophen interacts with a lot of commonly taken drugs, such as alcohol, ephinedrine, and lomitapide, not to mention things that most people don't consider drugs like white grapefruit juice. The reality is, unless you're a child or a teenager, you should just take aspirin. It won't damage your liver or give you an ulcer like acetaminophen or ibuprofen. And it is actually an anti-inflammatory, not just a fever reducer and mood-altering drug.
- iopq 13y ago
  I don't subscribe to the belief that people deserve to die for driving off the cliff. The reality is they should just take the bus.
- waqf 13y ago
  Aspirin does cause ulcers. If you have references showing that ibuprofen is more dangerous (or even differently dangerous) than aspirin I would be interested to see them.
  - cmccabe 13y ago
    That's a good point. I don't really have any hard information on which is more dangerous in terms of ulcers. I find conflicting information online. One thing is for sure: you should NOT take either aspirin or ibuprofen on an empty stomach. Always eat something first. I tend to lean towards aspirin for a few reasons. It's older (100 years versus 30 years old) so we've had more time to figure out what other side effects it has, as well as interactions with other drugs. The blood thinning effect reduces the chance of heart attack or stroke (while it's in your system), which is always nice. There are some studies which seem to show that aspirin has anti-cancer properties, but I'm not sure if I believe them, because they have not proposed a mechanism of causation. Finally, ibuprofen seems to be sold in higher doses in general and have a more intense effect, which isn't really want I want. I just want something that does the minimum most of the time.

x0x0 13y ago

Wow. But let's play along. Which other OTC medicines could being forgetful and accidentally taking a second dose cause death? Not to mention it's hidden in other medications which require careful label reading to discover. fta: "The 4 gram per day recommended dose is also the maximum safe dose, one that must not be exceeded, an unusual situation for any drug, particularly an OTC drug, one placing a large fraction of users close to a toxic dose in the ordinary course of use," the report said. that sounds like something extraordinarily dangerous to be handing out OTC and allowing companies to bury in other medications requiring people to be very careful to not accidentally double dose.

nknighthb 13y ago
Where did you get the idea that an extra 1g dose can be fatal? "Maximum safe dose" does not mean "exceeding this dose once is fatal".

cmccabe 13y ago

I don't subscribe to the belief that people deserve to die for not doing exhaustive research on the over-the-counter medications they take. You might want to rethink your position, since you apparently didn't do enough research yourself when you said that acetaminophen has "a lack of negative interactions with other drugs." Acetaminophen interacts with a lot of commonly taken drugs, such as alcohol, ephinedrine, and lomitapide, not to mention things that most people don't consider drugs like white grapefruit juice. The reality is, unless you're a child or a teenager, you should just take aspirin. It won't damage your liver or give you an ulcer like acetaminophen or ibuprofen. And it is actually an anti-inflammatory, not just a fever reducer and mood-altering drug.

iopq 13y ago
I don't subscribe to the belief that people deserve to die for driving off the cliff. The reality is they should just take the bus.
waqf 13y ago
Aspirin does cause ulcers. If you have references showing that ibuprofen is more dangerous (or even differently dangerous) than aspirin I would be interested to see them.
- cmccabe 13y ago
  That's a good point. I don't really have any hard information on which is more dangerous in terms of ulcers. I find conflicting information online. One thing is for sure: you should NOT take either aspirin or ibuprofen on an empty stomach. Always eat something first. I tend to lean towards aspirin for a few reasons. It's older (100 years versus 30 years old) so we've had more time to figure out what other side effects it has, as well as interactions with other drugs. The blood thinning effect reduces the chance of heart attack or stroke (while it's in your system), which is always nice. There are some studies which seem to show that aspirin has anti-cancer properties, but I'm not sure if I believe them, because they have not proposed a mechanism of causation. Finally, ibuprofen seems to be sold in higher doses in general and have a more intense effect, which isn't really want I want. I just want something that does the minimum most of the time.