Karenska,

Metallic taste is a very typical dry mouth sensation. Nothing tastes right because you don't have enough saliva to dissolve the food so your taste buds can "taste" it. How long have you been on Salagen? Are you doing anything else to improve salivary output?

I never took Salagen, since it has such a short half life, but went the Evoxac route when it was introduced in 2000. It's half-life is 4-6 hours so it helps me make more saliva a lot longer.

Before Evoxac, I would chew gum for 10 minutes about half an hour before a meal to generate a little saliva to make eating easier. Or such on a sugar-free cough drop or candy. Another trick was to eat a small salad or some fruit about 20 minutes before the rest of my meal to get some saliva going. Then I wasn't choking so easily later. For years before Sjogren's was confirmed, I often only ate salads in public to avoid choking on my food.

Obviously you will still need to use little sips of water during a meal to make it easier to chew and swallow. For some folks this gets to be less of a problem in time.

If your saliva glands are so inflamed that they just can't work right, all the Salagen won't make a huge difference. It was almost impossible for me to make an stimulated saliva until I started taking Plaquenil. The Plaquenil calmed the inflammation in my saliva glands and allowed them to regain partial function.

I understand that Evoxac and Salagen cost about the same. When you do get a rheumy, you might want to ask about making the switch. Evoxac not only improved output and quality, it gave me substantial tear improvement too.

I have Primary Sjogren's and have been a dental hygienist for 30+ years, but even then, I was shocked at how dry I had become and how long it took to get that part of me functioning again. Try not to get discouraged!

It does get better with time and the right meds.

Hi Karenska!

Metallic taste in my mouth was one of the very first symptoms I had and I went crazy trying to figure out what might be causing it. Of course now I know it was the SS but it was and is hard to deal with.

I take Salagen and it does help. For a while I thought it wasn't working so I stopped taking it. LOL, I learned fairly quickly that although it didn't solve my dry mouth it did help a lot!

Like DryRDH I also have dryness all the way down my esophagus which makes it hard to swallow stuff without some kind of liquid. I have swallowed my meds with what I think is enough water but a couple minutes later I burp and powder from one of the capsules pops out of my mouth in a small cloud!

I carry a mug of ice water or ice chips with me everywhere because my mouth gets so dry I can't talk.. Hard candies work too. Just remember that whatever you use to keep the juices flowing be mindful of calories - I always have something in my mouth and I put on a couple of pounds in the beginning.

Good luck and I hope you feel better soon! Hugs jilly

Wow, thanks so much for the hope!! I sent in a very long letter to you, but I can't find it, so if this is a duplicate, please excuse me. Oral surgeon finally did referral now I'm waiting for rheumy to call and make appointment as surgeon said they would.... I've been on Salagen for about 4 weeks now. Dr said I could take 9 a day if I wanted to, said I should thake 3 every 6 hours, after 2 at a time I break out in cold sweats, so I take 1 every three hours, and that seems to be working ok. I do chew gum and and use sugar free lemon cough drops along with sipping water, and lemon water, so far I haven't had problems with eating, maybe because it's always been a habit of mine to drink alot while I eat, I do have problems when it comes to eating crackers though, and of course I love crackers (I suppose my eating habits will need to change as well, but for right now, I'm working on quitting smoking, and that's basically all I can do for now) anyway I will check out these meds when I get to the Rheumy, thank you so much for your advise, at least I can hope to taste again...

reply above was for DryRDH, this one is for JIlliyT. That has got to be horrible, with the food and pills. I only got as bad as being kept up one night, the entire night with my mouth feeling like it was on fire and my tongue feeling as though it was shriveling up into nothing, that was the worst I have gotten and thankfully it was only a few days after that I went to oral surgen who gave me salagen, which works for me, I wish it worked a little better and longer, but it's so much better than it was before. I recently had a tongue infection a few weeks before this happened, but all in all I've had dry mouth for about 8 years, the taste issue didn't come up until Nov. 2010, and of course thats when I got concerned, went to four diffrent Dr's who did tests and came up with nothing, finally decided to get teeth cleaned and see if that had anything to do with it, then was sent to oral surgeon who did the gland biopsy. Thanks for responding.