Lucid Dreams Associated with Pregabalin: Implications for Clinical Practice

Abstract

Here, we describe a case of a patient with multiple myeloma who reported symptoms of lucid dreams. This patient was taking methadone for neoplasm related pain. The patient was also taking pregabalin which was initially started at dosing of 50 mg taken orally three times a day. Five days after initiation of pregabalin, the dosing was increased to 100 mg taken orally three times daily. The patient developed lucid dreams during a hospital stay and methadone was initially thought to be the cause of her lucid dreams. Methadone dosing was decreased with no success, and her lucid dreams persisted. On the patient’s thirteenth day of hospital admission, the pregabalin dose was decreased from 100 mg three times a day to 75 mg twice daily. Five days later, the pregabalin was decreased from 75 mg twice daily to 50 mg twice daily. Pregabalin was continued for five more days and then discontinued. Resolution of the lucid dreams occurred following discontinuation of pregabalin. To our knowledge, this is the first reported case of an association between pregabalin and lucid dreams. Given that pregabalin is a widely used medication, we found this case to be relevant to describe this unique presentation.

Keywords:

• Pregabalin
• lucid dreams
• cancer pain

Key Message:

• This is a unique case presentation of a patient who was found to have lucid dreams which were thought to be associated with pregabalin use. Once pregabalin was tapered to discontinuation
• this patient’s lucid dreams resolved.

Acknowledgements

Editorial assistance was provided by the Moffitt Cancer Center’s Office of Scientific Writing by Dr. Paul Fletcher & Daley Drucker. No compensation was given beyond their regular salaries.

Declaration of interest

The author reports no conflict of interest. The author alone is responsible for the content and writing of the article.

To ensure the anonymity of the subject in this case report, identifiable details of the case have been modified.

Funding

The author(s) reported there is no funding associated with the work featured in this article.