Burning pain secondary to clozapine use: a case report.

Authors

Bradley Linton, Department of Pharmacy, London Health Sciences Centre, 800 Commissioners Road East, North Tower, Room B7-002, N6A 5W9 London, ON, Canada
Rachel Fu, Department of Pharmacy, London Health Sciences Centre, 800 Commissioners Road East, North Tower, Room B7-002, N6A 5W9 London, ON, Canada
Penny A MacDonald, Brain and Mind Institute, Natural Sciences Centre, University of Western Ontario, N6A 5B7 London, ON, Canada & Department of Clinical Neurological Sciences, London Health Sciences Centre, University Hospital, Rm C7-002, 339 Windermere Road, N6A 5A5 London, ON, Canada
Hooman Ganjavi, Department of Psychiatry, University of Western Ontario, 800 Commissioners Road East, Zone B, Room B8-114, N6A 5W9 London, ON, Canada

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

10-23-2014

Journal

BMC psychiatry [electronic resource]

Volume

14

First Page

299

Last Page

299

URL with Digital Object Identifier

10.1186/s12888-014-0299-3

Abstract

BACKGROUND: The first of the atypical antipsychotics introduced in the 1970s, clozapine remains the most efficacious neuroleptic to this day. However, serious and potentially fatal side effects have necessitated careful regular monitoring among prescribing clinicians. Some adverse effects (e.g. ischaemic bowel) remain under recognized, while newly identified adverse effects continue to be described in the literature.

CASE PRESENTATION: In this report, we describe a healthy 43-year old Caucasian male who experienced onset of a full body deep burning pain several months after the onset of treatment with clozapine. The pain worsened over time, ceased with cessation of treatment, and returned soon after the patient was rechallenged.

CONCLUSION: We describe an unusual adverse effect from clozapine treatment that has not been described elsewhere to our knowledge. We present the time course of the pain symptom, relationship to dose, associated laboratory results, and ultimately how it was dealt with and how it improved for the benefit of clinicians who may encounter it in the future.