EDIT: For specificity, I’m on buspirone 7.5mg twice daily, but often miss a dose (unintentionally of course, life happens). When this happens, I’ll usually double up, even knowing I’m not “supposed” to, in order to stay on schedule.
In: 2
Uhh… what? Your question doesn’t make a lot of sense, could you explain more?
As read, your question is – Is there a difference between taking 1 medication twice a day… and taking 2 doses of a medication every day. Those are the same thing.
If you mean one dose versus 2 half doses then yes, you you will spend more time overall in the therapeutic dose range with 2 half doses. With one bigger dose you might spike out of the therapeutic range initially into the overdose range then taper down into the therapeutic range and eventually into the underdose range before your next dose. The goal of extended or controlled release drugs is to keep you in the therapeutic range longer. More frequent smaller doses are a less automatic way to accomplish the same thing.
If you mean is there a difference between taking 2x as much once a day, versus taking half a dose twice a day, then yes.
Not every medication absorbs or acts as long as others. Your body may also react and metabolize medications at different speeds.
An example. I take an inhaled corticosteroid twice a day (every 12 hours actually). It ensures that my lungs recieved a measured dose at regular intervals and there is always medication working in my system. My medication lasts in the body about 15-16 hours (according to my doctor), so taking 4 inhalations in the morning does not provide for medication for the last 8h or so. I notice if I miss a dose, but taking 3 or 4 inhalations instead of 2, doesn’t help my lungs feel better all day.
Yes there can be.
For a drug to work it has to be absorbed into the system. If it is already active it will work, if not the body will need to ketabize it to activate it. The body will then work on excretion the drug, which may involve more metabolism. Each of these steps takes time, there is some variance from person to person, but we know the average time that a person will take to metabolize a drug.
For a drug to work, the levels it reaches in your body must be in a particular range. This is called the therapeutic window. Too low, and it won’t have an effect. Too high and you risk side effects and toxicity.
Dose strength and frequency is worked out so that you will spend the most time with the drug levels in the therapeutic window, and have less risk of the levels going too high, or not high enough. You have to account for much and how quickly the body can absorb it. How easily it is distributed around the body and passes into the target cells. How quickly it metabolizes it and how it is excreted. Each of these stages is taken into account for the average person when dose and frequency recommendations are worked out.
So yes, changing the dose and frequency can alter the effects a drug has, even if the total dose in 24 hours is the same overall.
Yes there is a difference, because the half-life decay (actually your liver processing and getting rid of the medication) is [not linear](https://saylordotorg.github.io/text_general-chemistry-principles-patterns-and-applications-v1.0/section_18/261586c1c0844e5efa716d77033046ea.jpg). You’re imagining a linear decay but it’s not.
So not only are you spiking too high and too low when you skip and double-up, but it’s possible that your spikes can overload your liver. Fortunately for you, buspirone doesn’t seem to have a high [hepatotoxicity](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK547966/).
Yes. In general, meds are prescribed in ways to better maintain therapeutic blood levels.
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