HOW TO USE

Take this medicine by mouth with or without food, usually 4 times daily or as directed by your doctor.Dosage is based on your medical condition and response to treatment. Your doctor will usually direct you to take this medicine for your current injury only. Do not save this drug for future use. Follow your doctor's instructions when you reduce your dose, take it less often or stop taking medications can cause withdrawal symptoms patching, especially if it has been used regularly for long periods or in high doses. In such cases, withdrawal symptoms (such as abdominal cramps, insomnia, headache, nausea) occur if you suddenly stop taking this medicine. To prevent withdrawal symptoms, your doctor may gradually reduce the dose. Ask your doctor or pharmacist for more details, and report any withdrawal reaction immediately.Though it is very unlikely, this medication can also result in abnormal drug-seeking behavior (addiction / habit).

Do not increase your dose, take it more frequently or use for longer than prescribed. Right to discontinue medication when so directed. This reduces the chance of being addicted.Tell your doctor if your symptoms persist or worsen after 2-3 weeks.

Side effects

The usual dose of 350 mg is unlikely to engender prominent side effects other than somnolence, and possibly mild euphoria or dysphoria. The medication is well tolerated and without adverse effects in the majority of patients for which it is indicated. In some patients however, and/or early in therapy, carisoprodol can have the full spectrum of sedative side effects and can impair the patient's ability to operate a firearm, motorcycle, and other machinery of various types especially when taken with medications containing alcohol, in which case an alternative medication would be considered. The intensity of the side effects of carisoprodol tends to lessen as therapy continues, as is the case with many other drugs.
The interaction of carisoprodol with opioids, essentially all opioids and other centrally-acting analgesics, but especially those of the codeine-derived subgroup of the semi-synthetic class (codeine, ethylmorphine, dihydrocodeine, hydrocodone, oxycodone, nicocodeine, benzylmorphine, the various acetylated codeine derivatives including acetyldihydrocodeine, dihydroisocodeine, nicodicodeine and others) which allows the use of a smaller dose of the opioid to have a given effect, is useful in general and especially where injury and/or muscle spasm is a large part of the problem. The potentiation effect is also useful in other pain situations and is also especially useful with opioids of the open-chain class such as methadone, levomethadone, ketobemidone, phenadoxone and others. In recreational drug users, deaths have resulted from carelessly combining overdoses of hydrocodone and carisoprodol.
Meprobamate and other muscle relaxing drugs often were subjects of misuse in the 1950s and 1960s Overdose cases were reported as early as 1957 and have been reported on several occasions since then
Carisoprodol, meprobamate, and related drugs such as tybamate have the potential to produce physical dependence with prolonged use. Withdrawal of the drug after extensive use may require hospitalization in medically-compromised patients.

Usage and legal status

In the United States, while carisoprodol is not a controlled substance under federal regulations, as of February 2010, carisoprodol is considered to be a schedule IV controlled substance by the states of Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Indiana, Kentucky, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Mississippi, New Mexico, Nevada, Oklahoma, Oregon and Texas (scheduled using the state's new controlled substance program which requires physicians to obtain, and include, a state "DPS" number as well as a DEA number on all controlled substances prescriptions), Utah and Washington. It is a Schedule IV controlled substance in West Virginia The rest of the United States, excluding the above named states, falls under the DEA scheduling for the medication, which considers carisoprodol a non-scheduled chemical, meaning that carisoprodol is considered a general prescription medication by the federal government of the United States, with oversight provided solely by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA)

SOMA

Carisoprodol is a centrally-acting skeletal muscle relaxant. Carisoprodol is slightly soluble in water and freely soluble in alcohol, chloroform and acetone. The drug's solubility is practically independent of pH. Carisoprodol is manufactured and marketed in the United States by Meda Pharmaceuticals^. under the brand name Soma, and in the United Kingdom and other countries under the brand names Sanoma and Carisoma. The drug is available by itself or mixed with aspirin and in one preparation (Soma Compound With Codeine) along with codeine and caffeine as well.