I weighed a 50mg tablet of Zoloft and it weighed out at 150mg. So, is 50mg supposed to be the actual weight or just the amount of Sertralene HCl? What could the extra 100mg be comprised of? In other words, how do I account for the 100mg variance? Faulty scale? Mislabeled dose?
2007-03-17 04:24:30 · 3 answers · asked by bill johnson 1 in Science & Mathematics ➔ Medicine
Hm... all I know is that it's the only thing that helps me be normal. I'm really not concerned so much about the weight of the little pill. If I did, I might just get depressed again.
2007-03-17 04:28:33 · answer #1 · answered by tamara_cyan 6 · 0⤊ 1⤋
50mg is the actual amount of active ingredient in the tablet. The extra weight is most likely the weight of fillers to make the tablet more stable as well as the coating to make the tablet go down easier. There is also usually dye added to make the pill distinct from other pills.
2007-03-17 06:05:02 · answer #2 · answered by 988 2 · 1⤊ 0⤋
Sertraline is an odorless, white, sparingly soluble crystalline solid. The minimum effective dose is usually 50 mg per day (it can be still effective at 25 mg or 37.5 mg), but lower doses may be used in the initial weeks of treatment to acclimate the patient's body, especially the liver, to the drug and to minimize the severity of any side effects. Patients who do not experience relief of symptoms at 50 mg a day may have their dose increased, up to 200 mg a day.
The patent for this brand-name drug expired in June 2006. The drug is now available in generic form in the United States. The generic version of the drug is being produced by Greenstone Ltd. (a Pfizer Inc. subsidiary) and Israeli drug maker Teva. In Scandinavia a generic drug called Sertralin, manufactured by HEXAL, is available. The price differences between Zoloft and Sertraline are as much as 1.50 U.S. dollars per pill. In India, this drug is sold under the name Zosert.
Please see the web pages for more details on Sertraline (generic name) Zoloft (brand name).
2007-03-17 05:36:26 · answer #3 · answered by gangadharan nair 7 · 0⤊ 1⤋
50mg refers to the strength of the tablet not it's actual weight. Excipients such as fillers, binders, disintegrating agents and coatings add to the weight of tablets creating this discrepancy.
2007-03-18 13:53:06 · answer #4 · answered by Torrion 1 · 0⤊ 0⤋