long acting rilitan | ADHD Information

My son has been on Ritilan 10mg for about 4 months now and its not working they have upped his dose alot and it just seems to make him worse so they decided to change him and put him on a long acting ritlain i am not sure what types there are but has anyone had any trouble with the long acting ones?? my son doesnt sleep well as it is and i think a long acting one will make him worse again...

If Ritalin isn't working, why would they continue with it? They should try something else.

Many of the stimulants such as Ritalin will make the sleep issues worse. Lots of people here use Melatonin to help their children get to sleep. I use benadryl, since my son has allergies anyway.

There is Ritalin LA that is extended and my child did well on it and it was 10 MG.  My son takes 20mg of RitalinSR on school days only. It helps him.Long acting ritalin works really well for me, but i have to take it along with
strattera 3 times a day. I think the dosage just needs to be right.We use Ritalin LA 30 mg.  We started at the 20 mg and had to up it.  I like it because it gives us full coverage at school so he doesn't have to leave class to go take his meds.  It has effected his sleep but we have a new sleeping pill that works great.  He is finally sleeping through the night. Hi, we've tried a lot of combinations of Ritalin and Ritalin LA. We've found that Ritalin and Ritalin LA don't affect her personality negatively--she's her same bouncy self. The addition of guanfacine to her regimen enabled us to reduce significantly her Ritalin LA use. She is now on guanfacine .5 mg in the morning with Ritalin LA 20 mg, then another .5 mg guanfacine in the afternoon. Her appetite is back, but we still use melatonin at night to get her to sleep. When we had her on 50 mg Ritalin LA and 15 mg ritalin in the afternoons, she had these strange OCD-like behaviors picking at her fingernails and hair. In fact, instead of paying attention to the teacher she was messing with her fingers....Anyway, all children are different and have different needs. Keep trying until you find the right one. Good luck!

Hi,

my son was diagnosed bipolar and mixed ADHD.  The Ritilan made my son's behavior worse, expecially when it was wearing off.  He was more aggressive and aggravated, etc.  He also was put on the time released too.  That did the same  and he didn't eat much of anything for two months.  We threw it away and gave the doctor a hard way to go.  We read a lot on all this stuff and some just don't work.  Everyone's chemistry is different.   Also, I read if a child is truly ADHD the stimulant instantly calms them.  Didn't my 5 year old.   So we are still tinkering with medicine.  He currently takes Clonidine 1 -1/2 tsp (they can make it in liquid form) at night.  Helps him to sleep real well.  Depakote is for mood and seisure (he has little shaking) and Risperdal for the ADHD.  He still needs something else or something changed.  It is very frustrating i know.  Keep at the doctors.  Our son was admitted to a two week 1/2 day program to be monitored to watch the behavior.  Thats were Bipolar was diagnosed.  That is a hard one to diagnos.  Insurance covers so many visits and family therapy.   There is a book or video called  1-2-3 MAGIC BY DR. PHELAN.  Excellent.  Try to rent it from the library.  It was helped us a lot, but we still have a lot of anxious, defiant behavior that the poor kid can't control.   We found another psychiatrist because the one we are going to thru the hospital has a bad demeanor about her and she is not caring what so ever.  That upsets us so we have to wait(hopefully) until apr 20 to go to the new one.

The behavior at times has been the kicking, hitting, saying mean things, etc.  We took him directly to the hospital and had him evaluated a couple times.   They saw ADHD, develpmentally delayed issues (we know this), and behavior disorder.  There has been a lot going on with our son since he started to crawl.  Everything has been delayed plus apraxia of speech.l  He gets OT, PT and speech therapies.  The public school system can help a lot.  I.E.P's are very important because kids that have these problems don't fully learn what they are suppose to in these young years.   It is very tiring and frustrating.  Ya just want them to be "happy" and "perfect"!

Oh, doctor tried Adderall.  I gave my son two of those and threw them out too.  He was soooooooo aggravated and agressive and frustrated.  I called the doctor and she says break in half.  It was a capsule! 

Ritilan will keep him awake.  Clonodine is excellent.  Benedryl can mess with your brain chemistry = moody and dehydrated.  Just depends on the person though.  Melatonin works pretty good.  1/2 of what an adult dose is.  If a stimulant is making "issues" worse and doctor is upping dose, I would be finding another doctor.  That isn't right.  Sleep is very important for little kids.

Ritalin LA did not work for my daughter and then we tried Ritalin SR and that worked much better she needs a 10 mg ritalin in the afternoon and we give her 2 mg of melatonin at night.  She is doing very good on this combination maybe you just need to find the right combination still.  I know its frustrating trying to figure out the right dosage and the right medication.  Thanks the one he is on at the moment is Ritilian La 20mg, i can't see the specialist till the end of the month to get it changed to something else as he lives about 400 miles away and has to fly in once every few months