What does hydroxychloroquine do?

Hydroxychloroquine is used to treat malaria. It is also used to prevent malaria infection in areas or regions where it is known that other medicines (eg, chloroquine) may not work. Hydroxychloroquine may also be used to treat coronavirus (COVID-19) in certain hospitalized patients.

What are the benefits of hydroxychloroquine?

Over the long term hydroxychloroquine can reduce pain, swelling and joint stiffness. If you have lupus, it may also improve the rash. It may be as long as 12 weeks before you notice the benefits. Hydroxychloroquine is often taken in combination with other drugs such as methotrexate.

What is the downside of taking hydroxychloroquine?

Serious side effects

muscle weakness, cramps, stiffness or spasms, or changes in how your skin feels such as tingling. frequent infections with a high temperature, sore throat or mouth ulcers. bruising that happens more easily than usual.

What conditions does hydroxychloroquine treat?

Hydroxychloroquine is used to treat discoid lupus erythematosus (DLE) or systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE or lupus). It is also used to treat acute and chronic rheumatoid arthritis. This medicine is available only with your doctor's prescription.

Does hydroxychloroquine reduce inflammation?

Hydroxychloroquine is a disease-modifying anti-rheumatic drug (DMARD). It works by calming your immune system. This helps reduce swelling (inflammation) in people with autoimmune conditions, where your immune system attacks your own body.

Does Hydroxychloroquine work?

How does hydroxychloroquine make you feel?

Hydroxychloroquine may cause some people to be agitated, irritable, or display other abnormal behaviors. It may also cause some people to have suicidal thoughts and tendencies, or to become more depressed. If you or your caregiver notice any of these side effects, tell your doctor right away.

How long can you stay on hydroxychloroquine?

The study concludes that hydroxychloroquine therapy is safe for long-term use at doses <5 mg/kg/day. Learn about how lupus affects the eyes and hydroxychloroquine.

Does hydroxychloroquine help with fatigue?

Some studies have shown that it is effective in the treatment of pSS [31,32,33]. It is commonly used to treat fatigue, arthralgia, and myalgia [22, 34,35,36].

What is the major toxic effect of hydroxychloroquine?

Its main side effects are gastrointestinal upset (vomiting, diarrhea, stomach cramps), skin rash, headache, dizziness, and ocular toxicity. However, serious side effects including arrhythmia, bronchospasm, angioedema, and seizures can rarely occur.

What autoimmune symptoms does hydroxychloroquine help?

Hydroxychloroquine is in a class of medications that was first used to prevent and treat malaria. Today, it is the standard drug in lupus and can be used to treat rheumatoid arthritis, some symptoms of lupus, childhood arthritis (e.g. juvenile idiopathic arthritis) and other autoimmune diseases.

Is hydroxychloroquine hard on the body?

Hydroxychloroquine treatment can cause bone marrow depression, anaemia, aplastic anaemia, leucopenia, thrombocytopenia, agranulocytosis, and porphyria exacerbation. Risk factors include use of high doses and long-term use. Periodic full blood counts are recommended for patients on long-term therapy.

Is hydroxychloroquine a chemo pill?

Chemotherapy drugs, such as hydroxychloroquine, work in different ways to stop the growth of tumor cells, either by killing the cells, by stopping them from dividing, or by stopping them from spreading. Giving trametinib together with hydroxychloroquine may work better in treating patients with pancreatic cancer.

Does hydroxychloroquine affect the brain?

Hydroxychloroquine can induce adverse effects on the central nervous system, from irritability, nervousness, and emotional changes to true psychoses.

When is the best time to take hydroxychloroquine?

Take them with or just after food, or with a glass of milk. If you take antacids for indigestion, leave a gap of at least 4 hours between taking them and hydroxychloroquine.

What does hydroxychloroquine do to your skin?

Blue–grey pigmentation of the skin affects up to 25% of patients taking hydroxychloroquine, especially where there has been bruising. Transverse pigmented nail bands and mucosal pigmentation have also been reported. Rashes may occur in up to 10% of patients, most commonly morbilliform or psoriasiform.

Is weight gain a side effect of hydroxychloroquine?

Abnormal weight gain is a side effect of long-term doxycycline and hydroxychloroquine treatment. Gut microbiota modifications at the phylum level could play an instrumental role in this effect.

What does hydroxychloroquine do to your eyes?

One of the most significant side effects of the drug is its possibility of causing eye problems resulting in blurred or decreased vision. The most common issue is damage to the retina. It can impair your color vision or damage the retinal cells, particularly in the area right around the central vision.

Is hydroxychloroquine hard on the liver?

Hydroxychloroquine therapy has not been associated with liver function abnormalities and is an extremely rare cause of clinically apparent acute liver injury.

Does hydroxychloroquine make you not sleep?

Some medications' side effects, such as prednisone and hydroxychloroquine, may also cause sleeplessness. It is a good idea to take these drugs earlier in the day to reduce these potential effects.

Does hydroxychloroquine give energy?

Over time, Plaquenil helps reduce inflammation around the heart and lungs and improves symptoms such as fatigue, fever, and cognitive dysfunction. And patients report more energy because it's a mild stimulant.

Can you take vitamin D with hydroxychloroquine?

Interactions between your drugs

No interactions were found between hydroxychloroquine and Vitamin D3.

Is it OK to just stop taking hydroxychloroquine?

They should not stop taking the drug on their own without the help of their medical provider. Plaquenil stays in the body for around three months and it may take a while for side effects to go away. There is no official data regarding hydroxychloroquine or Plaquenil withdrawal symptoms.

Can hydroxychloroquine affect your heart?

Hydroxychloroquine and chloroquine can cause abnormal heart rhythms such as QT interval prolongation and a dangerously rapid heart rate called ventricular tachycardia.