Hey all, I have questions about tapering down on avs. I am two weeks in on 1000mg Valcyclovir 3x/day. I haven't had a spell of vertigo for over a week. I generally feel better. Wow!!!!! But...I do still feel off balance, dizzy, uncomfortable at times. Do I wait to taper until those things go away or do I taper soley based on actual rotational vertigo? I appreciate y'all's advice, my GP is letting call the shots in these dosages, she (of course) knows nothing about this treatment for menieres. The only reason I know about this is bc of this board! Thank you!
Good chances are, if you go off the antiviral altogether, if that is what you are asking by tapering off antivirals, your Meniere's symptoms will return. If you are asking when to decrease to 2000mg its a judgment call since you are still getting dizzy etc. You can wait another 2 weeks or so and see if your dizzy spells decrease, or you can decrease in another week, Dr Gacek's minimum length of time to decrease is 3 weeks and see if vertigo comes back or not, if it does go back up to 3000mg a day for another 2-3 weeks then try decreasing again.
Re: When to Begin Tapering Down AVs Yes, I did mean taper down, not off! So I need to see next Wednesday, my three week mark, if I feel like the dizziness is under control and go from there...if dizzy, even though not spinning, I should stay on the big dose a while longer.
The way I see it, if someone's MM is caused or triggered by an HSV, antivirals keep the virus in a latent state, but does not eradicate them. I am not sure how long the virus will stay in the latent state w/o an antivirals keeping it there. I guess we have a choice, take an AV until the virus is inactive, then go off and take an AV again if the virus becomes active again. Or stay on an AV to keep the virus inactive or take maybe take lysine at some point to do what the AV was doing. They are working on a drug that kills viruses called DRACO, but its not available yet. Monolaurin might be an alterative, but that still remains to be seen. But it seems so far the few people taking it are having good results with it. What amazed me about monolaurin was the literature said it actually kills viruses, bacterial infections and fungal infections in vitro. I wish they would do more long term trials on monolaurin to see if it really does kill viruses, that would be amazing.
I take antivirals plus Lysine. I have tried to go off the antivirals twice in the past 10 months and both times I ended up in bed sick with severe vertigo. As long as my Dr will continue to prescribe them and my blood work on kidneys and liver remain good, I will stay on them. I still experience some dizziness, have ear pressure and tinnitus but I feel a whole lot better with this treatment then without!