Versed

For those of you here looking for information on Versed, I thought an entire entry should be devoted to this wonderful, wonderful medication.

I have had it three times now - twice for steroid injections in my back and once for the extraction of my lower wisdom teeth - one of which was classified and BILLED as "difficult".

Now I suppose everyone responds to this medication differently. Most that I have talked to or read about report this medication as making you "forget".

Pretty much it's used as a sedative for medical procedures where a full general anesthetic isn't necessary.

Versed doesn't make me forget.

However, Versed does make me not give a damn.

It's wonderful, wonderful stuff.

Prior to when they started giving me Versed for minor procedures they would generally use opiate derivates like morphine or something of the sort. Yes, morphine is a great pain killer. Morphine is also a fair sedative, but it also makes you WAY cloudy.

With Versed you can still respond to verbal commands, have some BASIC understanding about what is going on, but you simply do not give a flying f*ck that someone is poking around your spinal cord with needles and/or pulverizing the bejesus out of your jaw.

The generic name of Versed is "Midazolam", and it looks like the closest thing to an "official" page you're going to find on it is its Wikipedia entry.

According to that, Versed is benzodiazepine derivative, which would make it similar to Valium. It's fast acting and has a quick elimination half-life so it is considered excellent for short, "minor" procedures like dental extractions.

Now, there are some critical of this drug - there's a site called Versed Busters about a couple of people who were given Versed without being warned first.

Uh, yeah - bad idea. I personally think Versed is Da Bomb, but if someone were to drop this in your I.V. without explaining it to you, you very well might be disoriented for a good long while.

Versed does also have one nasty side effect that I personally experienced during the back procedures. It can sometimes cause respiratory depression and respiratory arrest. With the HUGE honking dose they gave me during the second back procedure I had (5 hits I was told), they were having a pretty bad time with me in Recovery. Like I said - Versed pretty much makes you stop giving a damn - about EVERYTHING - like breating for instance.

The nurses kept yelling at me to breathe of course, but, you guessed it - you don't give a damn that the nurses are yelling at you either.

So, yes, you need to be carefully supervised in recovery after they give you this stuff.

During the wisdom tooth extraction yesterday they didn't give me nearly as much and I don't remember having any trouble breathing.

On the other hand they also hit me with nitrous oxide.

That's a SWEET mix, people.

If you have to have any sort "heavy" dental work like wisdom teeth extraction coming up, I HIGHLY recommend the Versed/nitrous cocktail ...