Successful treatment of pruritus with mirtazapine in a patient with advanced cancer

Purpose: To report a case of successful treatment of pruritus with mirtazapine in a patient with advanced cancer. Case summary: A male patient in his seventies with advanced malignant lymphoma had pruritus. The patient began to have pruritus within a few days after starting anti-epilepsy treatment....

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Bibliographic Details
Published inPalliative Care Research Vol. 7; no. 1; pp. 510 - 513
Main Authors Araki, Hiroto, Yamanaka, Kousuke
Format Journal Article
LanguageJapanese
Published Japanese Society for Palliative Medicine 2012
Subjects
advanced cancer
mirtazapine
pruritus
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Summary:Purpose: To report a case of successful treatment of pruritus with mirtazapine in a patient with advanced cancer. Case summary: A male patient in his seventies with advanced malignant lymphoma had pruritus. The patient began to have pruritus within a few days after starting anti-epilepsy treatment. Oral mirtazapine was administered at a dose of 15 mg/day. Within 2 days, the patient showed partial improvement of his symptoms. After 7 days of mirtazapine therapy, the pruritus significantly improved. While the patient was taking a dose of 15 mg/day, he remained asymptomatic. Conclusion: There are only a few reports (none in Japan) showing the effectiveness of mirtazapine against pruritus in patients with advanced cancer. Although the mechanism of the pruritus-relieving effect of mirtazapine is not fully understood, this case report indicates that mirtazapine may help in the treatment of patients suffering from intractable pruritus.
ISSN:1880-5302
DOI:10.2512/jspm.7.510