February 21 2006, 2:30 pm PT | Posted in: Drugs
What is your opinion on a lower dose of Propecia. I have heard that some doctors recommend every other (or every 3) days dosing. What is your stance on this?
Propecia has a half life of 4 hours. That means within a day, it is essentially gone from your system. Taking it every 3 days makes no sense, for you are undoing the DHT block that Propecia impacts. If you are going to reduce the dosage, then take a half tablet a day. I am under the impression that 1/2 tablet is 80% as effective as one tablet and 1/4 tablet is basically ineffective. I would want to know why you want to reduce the dosage from the most effective dose? The goal here is to grow hair, not see how little Propecia you can take.
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The Idea of taking a lower dose would be to have less potentional for the undesirable side effects,,right?
I have just found this paper from Sherman Frankel of U of Pennsilvania. He used the Freedom of Information Act to examine the FDA files on Propecia. The conclusions he draws from looking at the data sent to the FDA from Merck is that 0.2mg of Propecia is almost as effective as either a 1mg or 5mg daily dose. He also concludes that the potential side effects (loss of libido) may be reduced on a significantly lower dose. The study can be found at:
http://www.physics.upenn.edu/facultyinfo/frankel/papers/propeciafda2/index.html
Any comments?
“The goal here is to grow hair, not see how little Propecia you can take”.
Well considering the “ass raping” consumers take with the rising cost of Propecia compared to the cost of Proscar…the same damn ingredient, it’s no f*cking wonder people want to find the “real” dosage they can get away with…scumbag.
Temper, temper, zuel. Your “scumbag” comment was uncalled for. The “real” dosage is 1mg, just as has been approved by the FDA. If you want to take less, that is up to you as an adult — I just go by what my patients are taking and what I’ve seen work. There is a reason this medication is by doctor’s prescription. If you chose to not take it as prescribed, that isn’t my call to make. I do not set the prices. Direct your anger elsewhere.
I apologize. My anger is directed towards the F.D.A., the A.T.F, D.E.A. Not you. In fact it’s awesome that you take the time to actually help people online like this. :}
Let me put it this way 0.5mg of propecia once a day was enough to set my labido through the floor ie from a very healthy sex drive to getting no life at all from it and also a nice case of gyno that luckily was caught in time by my doctor so i didnt need an operation to remove the hard lump under my nipple.
The bottom line is approach this stuff with caution its more potent and dangerious than you can ever imagine…..trust me I know
i’m taking .25 a day and have heard it is effective. i’ll let you know in a few months if it works on me. it makes sense to take less a day if it works- a .25 dose was never adequately studied… and if it works you could be saving your prostate from a more malignant form of cancer. why are you under the impressiong that 1/4 is completely ineffective? from the studies, the dht reduction in the scalp was as significant as a 1 mg dose.
Well James, is it Working?
My doctor prescribed 1mg of Propecia, but when he was on holiday I saw his partner in the practise. He was adamant and gave me assurance that he had seen tests and read papers that I could use half the dose for the same effect on my hair. I guess the message is getting out there to docs. I will ask my doctor when he returns if he agrees. Meanwhile, with lowered sex drive, I am going onto the half dose!
.5 mg does prevent balding. I was on 1 mg and then went to .5 for severial years. after 10 years in total, 5 yrs 1mg, 5yrs .5 mg. it was after this that i went cold turkey for 10 months and notice thinning(DO NOT STOP COLD TURKEY). I did this to prevet the side effects. I never tried the .25 mg. but im going too. the only thing you can do is reduce the dose but pay attention to your hair! you will not be able to tell that you are experiencing catch up hair loss until it is bad. so if you do reduce your dose actually take a picture of your hair line every month and closely examine it. you think you can be able to tell but it happens so slowly and one day bamm it hits you that there is a change that doesnt go back. so if you have side efects and and have a partner you really can experiment. if you can use .5 and a viagra to have sex and your partner doesnt mind and you are having sex say once a week or so and both are happy then thats great. I have not heard any one post of results of using .25 mg. honestly at 1 mg there was two times i radomly was lucky to have a woman go to a hotel and was not able to perform! at .5 mg i can perform but have to really try! If i was just starting out I would take .25 mg of propecia for 3 months and test myself to see if i was having sides. here is the thing you have to actually have sex to make sure you are not getting sides. the propecia may allow you to get errect but not errect enough to have sex! so you may think your ok until the day you got to do it. he is why at .5 mg I noticed i could get hard but i would become soft very fast. In adition when you are hard enough to have sex or just look hard are 2 different things! I realized this and if i have take a viagra then I can become hard enought to have sex. no if you have a partner that doesnt mind waiting fine, but on a first date they will not put up with that so i take the viagra. My advice is to have sex with a patner at least once a week then start the .25 mg.
let the partner know what you are doing so they will not be mad if one day you cannot perform. then after say 3 months increase to .25 mg one day .5 mg next day, try that for three months, then maybe go up to .5 mg when you notice you canot have sex then go back down to the prior levels. another thing is to keep your partner happy! trust me on this. YOu r partner will not mind that your on propecia as long as you take care of bussiness once or twice a week. seriously ask how often they like it, make saterday the sex day and do things they want even if “your not in the mood” because propecia will make you not in the mood alot. just dont go on 1mg blindly with no communication. another trick is to tell a friewnd that you are going on the drug. another test is to get hard and count how long it takes you to get soft, then go on the propecia. see if there is a difference in time. there is! literally mine was like 20 seconds to being soft on 1mg. got of it for 1 month and it was over 1 mintute before i got soft. this is a big deal! this is the difference between being able to change positions in bed without haveing to get hard again. or be in the kiving room then move into the bedroom with loosing your power! also when you are errect it should hurt to bend your penis even slightly foward, after being on 1 mg propecia even thought i “looked hard” I could bend it foward with out it hurting. this means that when you go to have penetration you going to bend and go limp instead of penetrartion. the best thing is to have a girlfirined that will let you try this out allot. if your are not regulary dating try asking a frined after being on the propecia. it is so much better to pratice on someone who knows your on meeds that you can always stop, then to get on this medicine and not realize what is going on then be embarresed with a girl at the office! Viagra ans ciaias are kinda expensive so what happened to me was you have to take them 1 hr prior. so id pop one in at dinner on a date, but if i didnt get lucky then i had to go home and was errect! and wasted the pill. once i could not perform because i took the pill after we got home not realizing we would be in bed in less then 10 minutes. it helps to talk to someone who had to one thoer own figure all this out.
CAN SOME SPEICALLY POST ABOUT .25 mg usage. how long oyu used it what happend to your hair what was the side effects, did you ruduce your dosage or started on .25?