I have taken lortab 10 and was up to 5 a day. This was used for break-though pain only. I was on a longlasting pain med such as MS Contin also. The lortab is not met to last more than 4-6 hours and the more you use typicaly the more you will need. I too found it helped me get going but when it wore off I had to have my long acting in place or I would have double the pain to deal with. Talk to your dr about a 12 hour pain control in addition to the lortab for break-through pain. There are a lot of entries on the internet about break-though pain medications, dr's are just now understanding the need for them. Some dr's still do not believe in them but there are many becoming educated on the subject.

I wish you good thoughts
Hope

lortab is vicodin. It is the generic term for vicodin. Vicodin is a mix of hydrocodone and acetominophin.
Lortab 10 is not an actual dose - it should be lortab 10/325, 10/650, etc. The 10 means there are 10 mg. of hydrocodone and the second number represents how many mg. of acetominophen (tylenol) there is per tablet.
Long term use of tylenol can be damaging, its much better to use 10 mg of straight hydrocodone than 10 mg lortab which also contains the tylenol.

I took Lortab 10 when I was sent home from the hospital after my back surgery. I think the DR gave me 100. They lasted 4 weeks,and they helped with the pain,and yes they wear off fast, and I was amazed how fast my body had biult up a tolerance. They made me itch and sleepy.But I needed to rest so I guess they were ok,I was not on anything prior to my surgery. Where I live the Dr's are very strict about handing out narcotics,appearently even after major back surgery,after I ran out my dr did not refill it instead gave me Lyrica which worked at night and I recovered fast from the surgery anyways so I was ok. But yes Lortab 10's helped me.But by the end of the 3 weeks I was on them I could tell I needed to increase my dosage to the same amount of pain relief.

Lortab is hydrocodone just like vicodin, norco etc. Vicodin is 5 mg apap and different levels of acetominophen. Lortab is 10 mg apap with 650 mg acetominophen. Norco is 10 mg apap with 325 mg acetominophen. They are all the same just different levels of narcotic and Acetominophen.

I started out on Lortab 10 or Norco 10/325 in my case. Like all of the opioids, you tend to hit a tolerance wall. One thing I noticed is not to use the loss of the buzzy feelinas a indicator that the analgesic effect is less. My still worked great for pain control for a long time before I had to go up on meds.

Talk to your doctor and insurance company to see if they pay for Fentanyl patches. He might go along with the Fentanyl as the big gun and use Hydrocodone or percodone as break through. Read up on applying and keeping the patches applied.

After over 2 years of being on 75mcg change q48h with Percs for breakthrough, I had modifyed my daily activity to the point now I'm trying to get by with less (25 mcg/hq48h).

I have been on them twice when I had my first sugery 2 years ago and then I just had surgery again 2 months ago and am on them again. The first time I was on them for 6 months and my dr. kept lowering the dosage on them. My dr. also doesn't like to give them to you for long periods of time. I go back to see my dr. again in a month and I'm sure he will send me to a pain management. So I don't know what they will end up giving me. Because I am still in constant pain the second sugery didn't help. Good luck.

Mona