Antiepileptic drug gabapentin and fibromyalgia – the jury is still out

There is not enough evidence to recommend gabapentin to treat fibromyalgia pain, states a new Cochrane review of the evidence.Fibromyalgia is associated with widespread pain that lasts longer than three months, and is associated with poor sleep, fatigue, depression and reduced quality of life.

Gabapentin is an antiepileptic drug widely licensed for treatment of neuropathic pain. It is not licensed for the treatment of fibromyalgia, but is often used because fibromyalgia can respond to the same medicines as neuropathic pain.

But experts could only identify one trial of sufficient quality that assessed gabapentin in fibromyalgia. It involved 150 participants. Key findings were:

• 49% of people on gabapentin achieved 30% or greater reduction in pain;
• Change in any category of “better” was achieved by 91% of people on gabapentin and 47% with placebo;
• 19 people discontinued the study because of adverse events: 12 in the gabapentin group and seven in the placebo group;
• The number of serious adverse events were not reported.

“We have only very low quality evidence and are very uncertain about estimates of benefit and harm because of a small amount of data from a single trial,” the authors conclude. “There is insufficient evidence to support or refute the suggestion that gabapentin reduces pain in fibromyalgia.”

Click here to read the original research.

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