What is Ambien?

Ambien is the brand name for the drug zolpidem. It is a sedative-hypnotic approved by the FDA to treat short-term insomnia.¹

Does Ambien work?

Some patients have reported that Ambien helped them get to sleep more quickly. Some patients developed a tolerance to Ambien and had to increase their dosage. For others, Ambien didn’t seem to improve the length of time they slept.²

Zolpidem (Ambien) and other drugs like it have not demonstrated effectiveness in promoting sleep maintenance. ³

An analysis by the National Institutes of Health found that patients taking sleep medications reported satisfaction with their sleep but that sleep medications like Ambien only increased actual sleep time by about 12 minutes more than placebo.⁴

Why wouldn’t I want to take it?

Ambien has many side effects, some of them very dangerous. The most common side effects of Ambien include headache, dizziness, nausea and, less frequently, visual disturbances, hallucinations and balance disorders. Some patients may have strong allergic reactions to Ambien. In some cases, a strong allergic reaction can be fatal. ⁵

A potentially dangerous side effect of Ambien is called “complex behaviors,” which means that some patients who’ve taken Ambien do things in their sleep or in a drugged state that they can’t remember later, which may make no sense or may harm themselves or others. Patients have gotten out of bed after taking Ambien and gone sleep walking, injured themselves, broken bones, cooked food, bought things on the internet, gone “sleep driving” (the FDA defined sleep driving as “driving while not fully awake after ingestion of a sedative-hypnotic, with amnesia for the event”) and even woken on a flight to another state which they had no reason to take and no idea how they’d come to be there.⁶ Elderly people are particularly prone to these effects.

What if I’m already taking Ambien?

Never stop taking a prescription medication without talking to your doctor. Ambien can be addictive and does have withdrawal symptoms. ⁷

Patients who stopped taking Ambien have had their insomnia return, sometimes worse than before they started Ambien, and have had headaches, shaking, sweating, night terrors, blurred vision, thoughts of suicide and other symptoms. Many patients have said that their doctors were unaware that Ambien had these effects and told them that Ambien was not habit forming and did not have withdrawal symptoms. ⁸

Learn everything you can about Ambien before you start taking it.

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¹ Food and Drug Administration, Medication Guide Ambien Tablets (April 2010), http://www.fda.gov/downloads/drugs/drugsafety/ucm085906.pdf
² EverdayHealth.com Patient Forums, http://www.everydayhealth.com/drugs/ambien/review; TalkAboutSleep.com, Patient Forums, http://www.talkaboutsleep.com/message-boards/viewtopic.php?t=16713
³ Ann Clin Psychiatry, Rosenberg RP, “Sleep Maintenance insomnia: strengths and weaknesses of current pharmacologic therapies” (Jan-Mar 2006), http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16517453
⁴ New York Times, Saul S., “Sleep Drugs Found Only Mildly Effective, but Wildly Popular” (23 October 2007), http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/23/health/23drug.html?pagewanted=print
⁵ National Institutes of Health, Kirkwood C. at al., “Zolpidem modified-release in insomnia,” (October 2007), http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2656288/
⁶ “Highlights of Prescribing Information,” (2007), http://www.accessdata.fda.gov/drugsatfda_docs/label/2007/019908s022lbl.pdf ; EverdayHealth.com Patient Forums, http://www.everydayhealth.com/drugs/ambien/review
⁷ “Highlights of Prescribing Information,” (2007), http://www.accessdata.fda.gov/drugsatfda_docs/label/2007/019908s022lbl.pdf ;
⁸ Topix.com, Patient Forums, “Ambien Withdrawal and Headaches,” http://www.topix.com/forum/drug/ambien/T8MMMFNQIK6VHJOV6; TalkAboutSleep.com, Patient Forums, http://www.talkaboutsleep.com/message-boards/viewtopic.php?t=16713