According to researchers in Pakistan, the relatively common drug Lamictal may cause a rare but deadly side effect called SJS.

Background on SJS

SJS is short for Stevens Johnson Syndrome, a type of autoimmune reaction that attacks the skin. In autoimmune reactions like SJS, the immune system malfunctions. Normally, the immune system disables and kills bacteria, viruses, and other parasites. But in autoimmune reactions, the immune system “thinks” that the patient’s own tissue is an invading germ and attacks. In the case of SJS, the body attacks the largest organ on a person’s body, the skin.

SJS symptoms include generalized, flu-like symptoms at first: muscle aches, fever, and chills. But SJS symptoms rapidly escalate to a painful skin rash accompanied by sores, blisters and ulcers. This damage can spread to the eyes, and even the internal organs. The damage to the skin can resemble burns, and patients face many of the same complications as burn victims, including dehydration, hypothermia at room temperature, and aggressive secondary infections, all of which can be fatal. When SJS damages the lungs, deadly fluid can build up within the lungs, suffocating patients. Despite SJS fatality, doctor often fail to recognize SJS because it is relatively rare and in the early stages SJS is often mistaken for a variety of viral infections like influenza, herpes, chickenpox/shingles, and other viruses.

Though many questions remain about SJS, it is known that nearly all cases of SJS can be traced to drug exposures. Certain relatively common genes appear to make some people more likely to develop SJS after taking certain drugs, including drugs like Lamictal. However, many questions remain, as some people with the suspect genes and alleles never develop SJS even after taking Lamictal and other drugs and some people without these risk factors develop SJS anyway.

Lamictal SJS Research

According to doctors Shama Parveen and M. Afzal Javed, the Lamictal SJS study’s authors, Lamictal is a commonly used anticonvulsant that doubles as a mood stabilizer. And while SJS “has not been reported very commonly, SJS has high mortality and morbidity and requires careful attention as the use of Lamotrigine is increasing in clinical practice,” according to their paper.

The paper from the Pakistan Medical Journal by Drs. Parveen and Javed also included a detailed case report on a woman who’d suffered from SJS after taking Lamictal. In this case, a 56-year-old female had been hospitalized for suicide attempts twice and prescribed Lamictal as a mood stabilizer. Lower-grade antidepressants had little effect, but Lamictal seemed to help her condition considerably. Over the course of two weeks, her anxiety and depression symptoms more-or-less resolved. However, 16 days after she was discharged from the hospital, she developed the first signs of Lamictal SJS, a fever and an Lamictal SJS rash.

Since Lamictal SJS was a medical emergency, she was put in intensive care after only four days of SJS symptoms. After ceasing medication—under a doctor’s supervision—her symptoms improved. After two weeks, she was deemed recovered enough to leave the hospital, though she had ongoing eye problems from Lamictal SJS that took several more weeks to fully heal.

Lamictal SJS lawsuits have been filed by patients who developed SJS after taking drugs like Lamictal. These SJS lawsuits typically allege that drug makers failed to adequately protect the public from the risk of SJS from their drugs. Other SJS lawsuits have alleged that doctors and medical centers failed to diagnose SJS quickly and treating it correctly.