Hydrocodone-acetaminophen 10/325 By Mallinckrodt (Top voted first)

My pharmacy changed my meds from the yellow 10-325 v 3601 norco to the 10-325 white m367 mallinckrodt. I've been taking the yellows for years with no problems. Today I started the whites and feeling dizzy, a little weak, kind of panicky. What is different about the two meds that would cause this?

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I was able to refill my prescription for the Qualitest (yellow tablets) and am getting used to the SIGNIFICANTLY lower dose again. But I am hurting, and I had to drive several miles to find a pharmacy that is still filling opiate prescriptions. I live in greater Los Angeles... so I hope that gives an indication of how ridiculous this is. It was pharmacy #14, which means I contacted 13 other pharmacies first who said they will no longer fill prescriptions of Norco since it was made a class II drug. I don't understand why people in pain are being punished because of the illegal actions of drug addicts. This is so wrong!

I'm trying not to be bitter--but then

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I have had the same problem in spades. I am in so much pain and they are making it harder and harder to get my medication. Regarding the generic drugs not working, I finally mailed samples of the Amneal Norco (which does nothing; may as well take an M&M) to the manufacturer and contacted the FDA about it. The FDA responded that they are "within legal limits" regarding the amount of the actual active ingredient (Hydrocodone). When I pressed the FDA rep, he explained that manufacturers are allowed to VARY THE ACTIVE INGREDIENT AS MUCH AS TWENTY (20) PERCENT IN EITHER DIRECTION from the brand name! So rather than 10 MG., you could get either 8MG or 12 MG per pill and that is just fine by the FDA!. Unbelievable. If I can help others, the Watson GENERIC (not name brand) works the best, has probably 10 MGs as advertised. Qualitest probably has about 9 MGs; it does take the edge off the pain at least. Amneal is useless. I find it hard to believe that they have even 8 MG. I'd rather take a 5MG Watson any day.

In any case, everyone will try to tell you that "it is in your head" and the generic drugs are all the same. They are NOT. And you are being lied to. Our FDA is shameless for allowing this to take place legally: A VARIATION BY AS MUCH AS 40% OF THE ACTIVE INGREDIENT IN GENERIC DRUGS. It is NOT in your head. Watsons are impossible to come by anymore. If you can get Qualitest, that is the best you can hope for. Sorry.

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Well, if I was an attorney, I would file suit or try to find some way to challenge this ridiculous FDA policy regarding generic drugs. It is dangerous to allow this much of a difference between generic drugs. Now, they've made it nearly impossible to even get the worst generics regardless of your level of pain or your situation. I'm just appalled and have lost all faith in our healthcare system. Every part of it is broken. And the FDA is at the top of this list of agencies that need reform.

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No, I just hope to help others going through this same frustration. The generic drugs are not the same--and when online forums tell people that "they are all equivalent and it is all in your head", I need to say something. :-)

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When you say, "The 10 & 325 portions should be pretty equivalent between manufacturers," you are incorrect. (Sorry, but people need to understand what the FDA has done to generic drugs--and this statement is just not true.)

In fact, the active ingredients in a generic drug can vary by as much as FORTY (40) PERCENT from one generic drug to another. So if you have a headache, nausea, shakes, etc. and you have just changed to a different generic after being on the same generic for years, then you could very well be feeling withdrawal symptoms because you are now getting 40% less of the active ingredient(s) than in the past. Alternatively, you could be extremely intoxicated and cause grave harm to yourself or others should the pharmacy give you a generic with 40% MORE of the active ingredient that you are used to taking and you get behind the wheel.

This is a truly shameful policy that the FDA has put into place. My father is on blood thinners--and per his doctor, it is CRITICAL that he get the same generic every time because the huge variation from one generic to another could cause him to either bleed to death or develop a blood clot. A 40% variance between different manufacturers of the same generic drug is unbelievably dangerous, yet it is completely legal for drug companies to do this. (I actually spoke to someone at the FDA who told me all of this--I just really couldn't believe what he was telling me.)

How many lives have been lost because of this harmful and reckless generic drug policy?! How many overdoses (opiates), suicides (antidepressants), and car crashes (any one of a number of sedative or opioid drugs) will it take for them to change it?! Nope. They won't. They just point fingers at the patients and say they are "abusers". No one even TALKS about this when people overdose! But I am absolutely certain that this policy is causing opiate deaths.

This policy has caused me and my family great harm and it wasn't until last year that I learned what was really going on. You cannot trust generic drugs. But sadly, insurance will NOT pay for name brand drugs. And while doctors know all about this, they are loathe to insist on name brands because they are hassled continuously by insurance companies for doing so. And if they write a specific generic on the prescription, you will just be turned away by one pharmacy after another. They will NOT get the generic you need because it costs them too much--and the insurance companies won't reimburse them. So they buy the cheapest possible generic drugs from India. And they don't work.

The U.S. healthcare system is SO broken.

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Sorry, I don't know the answer to your question... but I wanted to let you know that there are many different varieties of "white" Norco. The generic "white Norco" manufacturers I'm aware of are Amneal, Tris Pharma, and Malincrodt (sp?). None of these generic drugs have anywhere near 10MG of hydrocodone in them (usually closer to 8 MG). Unless you have little to no tolerance, they will not help with acute or chronic pain. The Qualitest generic (which is yellow) probably has between 9-10MGs, and the Watson generic (White) likely has close to 10MGs. This is because Watson is also the company that makes the brand-name drug, Norco.

Norco has gotten very difficult to find in any pharmacy besides Walgreens. (Walgreens has the white Watson Norco, but my insurance won't cover it--and it costs $95 per prescription if I go outside of my insurance network.) But if you can go to Walgreens--that would be my suggestion. CVS has Malinkrodt--you may as well take sugar pills; and all the little mom-and-pop pharmacies are hit and miss. One month they'll have Qualitest and all is well; the next month, they have Tris Pharma and I'm in complete agony all month long.

I hope this helps a little. I know it is very frustrating to realize that many generic drugs on the market do not work and that as a consumer, you have no recourse but to take these sub-standard, low-quality pills and suffer through the pain. Good luck!

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I was switched from a yellow pill (pharma unknown) to a white pill a few months ago that is made by Tris pharma inc. I never considered all the problems that I am having being related to the change. Yes, my pain is so much worse, but I am having bouts of high blood pressure (pain and anxiety both cause this) and have had to take xanax to relieve it. I have xanax but usually did not have to take during day, just to sleep. Stomach problems are worse, severe constipation, having headaches. When I googled generic Norco, I have found all kinds of comments about it being of quality. Very interesting comments here. I was unaware of the FDA regulations. However, it crossed my mind that with the big opiate abuse problems, it is not unrealistic to think that ingredients could not be substituted during compounding. Hey, the coast guard lost 4000 lbs of coke during a bust! sure they did! I googled Tris and they have many really bad employee reviews, who say safety and quality assurance are below adequate. That is not good in the pharm business. I am going to have my meds evaluated. I swear I feel like I am being poisoned.

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hi i take the 10-325 hydrocodone apap tablet malli and i was takeing the yellow 10-325 witch helped me i have a very bad back and spine problems the whit pills do noting but give me headackes and upset stomack i have been on vicodin for many years now that the drugs store gave me the white pills they do not work but make me sick what can i do?

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The 10 & 325 portions should be pretty equivalent between manufacturers. The inactive portions are quite different. The solubilities of Qualitest and Mallinckrodt are very different. The Malli's dissolve rapidly in hot water, the Quali's take time to dissolve. The absorption rates are therefore different. THEY ARE NOT THE SAME...and the pharmacist treats you like a KooK if you say they are different. I got stuck with Malli's this time. Never again, keep trying & you will find a pharmacy that carries Qualitest or Amneal. The problem with the Mallinckrodt pills is that they give me VERY BAD HEADACHES & make me VERY DIZZY. Sure they relieve pain but you end up with 2 very unpleasant side effects.

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I know I can't believe what's happening, it should be illegal, they regulate the meds so much these days, why not regulate what goes in it, regulate the fillers that are making people sick, why are we getting ripped off! Why are we buying our meds from other countries! This is a total nightmare for people whom live in pain everyday!

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Unfortunately, I suspect you are correct in your statement implying that the mallinckrodt 10/325 tablets contain less hydrocodone than other brands. They are the only brand I ever tried where there was no constipation associated with taking this medication. However, since pharmacists will INSIST all brands are the same, I choose to focus on the negative side effects of the mallinckrodt tablets. Anyway, one more reason not to use mallinckrodt, even if you have to pay out of pocket at Walgreens. Funny, everyone else takes my insurance.

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the generics can vary several milligrams, more or less. doesnt seem right but the regulations allow for the variances. thats why some prescriptions work and some dont. some just dont have the prescribed amount.

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I have taken Hydrocodone 10-325 for years for chronic pain. It was the yellow oblong tabs.

This time, however, I went to a different pharmacy that uses a different manufacturer.

As soon as I took the new medication, I had an anaphylactic reaction within 20 minutes.

I believe the manufacturer either has a quality control issue or the pharmacy contaminated the product.

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Watson company has recently been bought out, BUT the yellow pills are still available. Your doctor CAN order the yellow capsules, which means that the PHARMACY -- if they want to keep your business -- WILL order those particular meds.

However, I believe the day will come when a legal case is filed against the company because of all the problems with it.

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This is all new information for me and have read through almost all of the comments. I've gone from angry to shocked to incredulous and now I am incensed.

Here's my question. Where do Insurance companies... who of course have much more wisdom and apparently know what is best for each and every one of the thousands (millions?) of patients (which are actually human beings, not statistics or worse, lab rats), much more so than do our individual PCP's and other doctors, who, you know, actually see us and take our blood pressure and speak with us for at least 5 minutes... where do they get this wisdom? And why don't they share it with the medical community? They get it from the great wallet in the sky, you say?

OK, then let the insurance company pay the generic price for the manufacturer pill and we pay the difference, simple, right? Oh no! They wont allow that, but it is OK to have us pay a co-pay but it is not OK for us to pay the difference between generic & brand name. Why not? We'd get that choice if we were buying, oh, I don't know, a toaster oven!

Because if this happened the generic manufacturers would go out of business for having a sub-par product, because like anything else in a 'free' market, people tend not to buy junk, at least not a second time. A truly free market helps to ensure quality.

So it is perfectly fine for the FDA and insurance companies and whatever other powers that be, to regulate medications in such a way that it strips away the 'freedom' from the market which in and of itself would produce better quality, uniformity and safer drugs among drug manufacturers.

And as I think RhoRhoRho said, they have the perfect patsies to do a bait-and-switch on, passing along their culpability to the chronic pain sufferer whose mind, you know, are addled by narcotics and opioids, can't trust those people.

I am one of those chronic pain patients whose mind is addled by pain medication. I do not wish my condition on anyone however, the day is coming that many of these people who screw with the system (for financial gain or other reasons, such as the insurance companies, FDA, even doctors themselves) are going to experience some medical malady and then they will know what they have perpetrated upon us. That is if their minds are not addled with pain because they cannot get the medications that they need, only sub-par, possibly even dangerous medications.

I said pain, and not pain medications because it is pain that makes it difficult for someone to concentrate and think. Someone in actual chronic severe pain does not feel high or feel euphoria when taking these medications. I never felt anything but pain reduction which makes it possible for me to be productive and still have some quality of life.

We have been insulted, stigmatized, marginalized, made to jump through rules and regulations from doctor's to insurance companies to pharmacies (many of which are in direct contradiction of the rules of the other) and are actively being treated as lab rats without our knowledge.

And we have no recourse. Because our health is gone we neither have the strength nor the financial ability to fight for ourselves. We're easy pickings.

Doctors have a huge coalition of power that they don't mind using to lobby Washington for financial gain with but will not use it to help the patients that they swore an oath to 'first do no harm' to, shame on them.

That oath apparently has lost its meaning. They must still do it for sentimentality reasons, it is quaint, you know, it's like saying "I Do" until, well, "I Don't".

If you made it this far, thank you for reading. I wish you well.

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Mallinckrodt pain pills are a joke; worthless. How they stay in business, I don't know. Someone at the Mallinckrodt plant must be taking hydrocodone out the back door, as it damn ain't going into the pills... Unless you want to puke or have a bowel movement, don't take one! How do we file a legal suit against Mallinckrodt? It is bad enough to have back pain, I don't need stomach pain too!

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Re: Verwon (# 2)

They are not slight fluctuations. That is the garbage the generic producers have been feeding us for years!! Its a crock!! The white pills are crap!! We know our bodies well enough to know when something is off!! Its all garbage these days!! Just like all the sizes of food in grocery stores is getting smaller so is the active medicine getting lesser in our meds. Its so f***ed up!! Ive been on the same medicine for ling enough to know when its effectiveness is being tampered with!! Stay away from the Amneal medicine!! It is pure s***!! It caused me anxiety, upset stomach, migraine and no pain relief!! I cant stand what is going on with the medicine I need to give me quality of life!!

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Re: mama bear (# 20)

These drugs are full of poison - there has to be something in them besides fillers and binders that are making so many of us so sick from headaches to stomach issues to just no pain relief at all - I was forced into withdrawals when suddenly the vicodin i had been taking for over 3 years stopped making them. The manufacturers don't give a s*** about us. I have now tried at least 3 different manufacturers now and none and i mean none of them even come close to the vicodin i had been on all these years. Don't tell me they are all the same. If someone tells you they are all the same and it's in your head then ask them what they are basing that on and what drugs do they take? I guarantee you they are taking a "cocktail" of drugs. When you are taking multiple drugs every day sure you don't notice any difference. But I only take ONE drug and that is vicodin so when they screw up my medicine I know immediately within 30 minutes of taking one pill. Watch out for any narcotics made by Mikart out of Atlanta. They put poison in the pills now and will lie to you and act innocent when you contact them as I have personally done. It's all lies and bulls*** and we will suffer from now on because they have taken the medicine OUT of the pills.

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Re: cliff j (# 132)

I work in a pharmacy and I hate to break it to you but pharmacists absolutely can speak to the patients doctors regarding their medication treatment plans. Some pharmacies are required to ask and document certain things if the patient is taking a certain amount of C2 pain medications. Some things they will want to know are for how long they will be on these meds, have they tried and failed different meds before being prescribed the current meds, what is the diagnosis, does the dr have any plans reduce and/or discontinue the meds, etc. And if a patient takes pain meds along with any benzos, such as Xanax, and they are prescribed by 2 different drs, my pharmacy has to now call one of the drs to find out if they are aware that they are being prescribed both these meds and we are to document what the dr says before we can even fill them! Can you just imagine if the patient needs one or both of these meds and it just happens to be a day or time the dr office is closed?!? God forbid if it falls on the weekend or a holiday! The person would have to go w/o their much needed meds until we can get ahold of their dr!! I feel this is excessive and ridiculous!

Workers in the pharmacy are getting blamed and yelled at and while I don’t blame the people being pissed off and frustrated, it isn’t our doing and we absolutely hate it as much as they do!! Things r getting extremely difficult for pain patients to get their meds anymore since the so called opioid crisis!! I’m a chronic pain patient and have been on these meds for 19 years and I’m getting so frustrated with what I’m seeing from day to day!! I also believe that the drug manufacturers r doing something to the meds because they worked just fine until bam one day soon after the crisis began my husband, who also takes these meds, began to notice that they just don’t work hardly at all anymore! I know people build up a tolerance but come on now that’s NOT gonna happen in one months time to two separate people!! They are so f***ing with these meds!! I’ve also noticed that a lot of times now I will get very nauseous when taking them and stomach pain, sometimes with loose stools as well! I just know the manufacturers are putting some kind of anti abuse ingredients in them that r making them WAY less effective and making some people sick!

Anyway, I apologize for the book and going off the rails and for also giving you more than you asked for!! I’m just so sick and tired of what is going on with opioids these days and whatever the government has cooked up and doing behind our backs in agreement with drug manufacturers! It’s so wrong and messed up and having severe negative impact on pain patients that are in desperate need of these meds to function from day to day and are taking them as prescribed, not abusing them and r being extremely punished just because some people r abusing illegal meds that have NOTHING at all to do with prescription pain meds that r being sold in pharmacies in a responsible manner!! I would love any feedback from people on how they feel about what is going on with these meds!

Thank you!

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I do understand how you feel, they also keep changing things and making it much more difficult for many people to get the help they need.

I feel bad for everyone and wish there was something that could be done.

How are you feeling?

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