Gabapentin, sold under the brand name Neurontin among others, is an anticonvulsant medication primarily used to treat partial seizures and neuropathic pain. It is a first-line medication for the treatment of neuropathic pain caused by diabetic neuropathy, postherpetic neuralgia, and central pain. It is moderately effective: about 30–40% of those given gabapentin for diabetic neuropathy or postherpetic neuralgia have a meaningful benefit.Sleepiness and dizziness are the most common side effects. Serious side effects include an increased risk of suicide, respiratory depression, and allergic reactions. Lower doses are recommended in those with kidney disease. Gabapentin acts by decreasing activity of a subset of calcium channels.Gabapentin was first approved for use in 1993. It has been available as a generic medication in the United States since 2004. In 2020, it was the tenth most commonly prescribed medication in the United States, with more than 49 million prescriptions. During the 1990s, Parke-Davis, a subsidiary of Pfizer, used a number of illegal techniques to encourage physicians in the United States to prescribe gabapentin for unapproved uses. They have paid out millions of dollars to settle lawsuits regarding these activities. Medical uses
Gabapentin is recommended for use in focal seizures and neuropathic pain. Gabapentin is widely prescribed off-label in the US and UK, for example, for the treatment of non-neuropathic pain, anxiety disorders and bipolar disorder. Seizures
Gabapentin is approved for the treatment of focal seizures; however, it is not effective for generalized epilepsy. Neuropathic pain
Gabapentin is recommended as a first-line treatment for chronic neuropathic pain by various medical authorities.
Cerebral vasculitis (sometimes the word angiitis is used instead of "vasculitis") is vasculitis (inflammation of the blood vessel wall) involving the brain and occasionally the spinal cord. It affects all of the vessels: very small blood vessels (capillaries), medium-size blood vessels (arterioles and venules), or large blood vessels (arteries and veins). If blood flow in a vessel with vasculitis is reduced or stopped, the parts of the body that receive blood from that vessel begins to die. It may produce a wide range of neurological symptoms, such as headache, skin rashes, feeling very tired, joint pains, difficulty moving or coordinating part of the body, changes in sensation, and alterations in perception, thought or behavior, as well as the phenomena of a mass lesion in the brain leading to coma and herniation. Some of its signs and symptoms may resemble multiple sclerosis. 10% have associated bleeding in the brain. Causes
"Primary" angiitis/vasculitis of the central nervous system (PACNS) is said to be present if there is no underlying cause. The exact mechanism of the primary disease is unknown, but the fundamental mechanism of all vasculitides is autoimmunity. Other possible secondary causes of cerebral vasculitis are infections, systemic auto-immune diseases such as systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) and rheumatoid arthritis, medications and drugs (amphetamine, cocaine and heroin), some forms of cancer (lymphomas, leukemia and lung cancer) and other forms of systemic vasculitis such as granulomatosis with polyangiitis, polyarteritis nodosa or Behçets disease.