Current Treatments & Medications on the Horizon By Wendi Kitsteiner
Y
ou walk into your doctor’s office and walk out with a diagnosis of narcolepsy. What does that mean? Where do you go next? What does treatment look like for you?
Classical narcolepsy includes daytime sleepiness, but in order to be diagnosed, there are other features that need to be deemed present as well. The three main symptoms associated with narcolepsy include:
Dr. Michael Thorpy, MD is director of the SleepWake Disorders Center, Montefiore, and professor of neurology, Albert Einstein College of Medicine. He took the time to speak with Healthier Sleep Magazine regarding this important topic for patients dealing with sleep issues.
• Excessive daytime sleepiness.
Dr. Michael Thorpy
NARCOLEPSY According to Dr. Thorpy, “If a patient presents with excessive daytime sleepiness, and we determine that the patient has narcolepsy, we need to determine the severity of it and what the clinical features are.”
14 | Autumn 2021 | Daytime Sleepiness
• Abnormal REM sleep phenomena of which cataplexy is the main symptom. (Cataplexy is defined by a sudden loss of muscle tone while a person is awake.) • Disturbed nocturnal sleep.
Many patients with a narcolepsy diagnosis will require a combination of drugs, however, the first line of drugs is most always a medication called oxybate. “There are two different types of oxybate,” Dr. Thorpy explained. “There is sodium oxybate which has a high content of sodium associated with it. And then there is a newer form also known as low-sodium oxybate or mixed cation oxybate which has about 92% less sodium.” The choice between drugs has mostly to do with the fact that many patients dealing with narcolepsy may also be facing cardiovascular challenges (and some other medical conditions) that require them to not be consuming large amount of sodium.
