Medicine getting stronger as we taper down to lower dose?

[SpinachHands]

This is an odd one, and more of a general medicine question than ME, but I know this forum is great at things like this.
My partner started Amantadine on 25mg and tapered up to 50mg, but started getting this feeling of it "overshooting" where they were benefitting, into feeling worse. We've been tapering down gradually (only 1-2mg at a time) but it feels like the medicine is getting stronger the lower they go. The most common side effects is low blood pressure, which they didn't get at 50mg, but have started getting now they're down at 20mg. If they go down by 2mg the overshoot effect does lessen, but then the same dose the next day it'll feel higher. It feels like a race, every time we try lowering it, it gets stronger to catch up. Any ideas why this is happening? We really want to find a dose of this that is workable, but just can't seem to get it low enough.

 

[linusbert]

could be what you experience could be something different, a accumulation effect that increases every day. a lot of medications work like this. some diabetes medications build up over weeks and months.
but dose dependent effects are also known, but i know not much about this. some meds seam to indeed to have different effects depending on the dose.

 

[Florida Guy]

It could be what linusbert suggested. I have noticed that sometimes lowering the dose of something will make it work just as strongly as before or maybe more. One example is mirtazapine for sleep. I started with 1 tab around 25mg and it worked and was strong. I cut it in half and it worked just as well. I kept cutting the dose and it kept working until I was down to less than 1mg and it still worked. Later, years later, I had to start taking more and I don't really like it. Mirt is not that great but it shows how lowering the dose does not always lower the response. Some people get that with melatonin too.

Just keep lowering the dose as you see fit

 

[linusbert]

also doctors often overdose by standard medical practice, i know this from diabetes medication. the one thing i take is pioglitazone , and i was prescribed 30mg per day. after doing research and checking papers, actually almost the same glucose response could be archived with just 7,5mg.. but it takes over month that way and with 30mg its within weeks.
the 7,5mg dose did not have the bad side effects in the studys... so at some point, giving more than 7,5 would not yield much benefits in glucose control but increases side effects a lot.

i also found out something similiar for metformin.

so there is a thing in medicine, I BELIEVE, that they overdose medications , probably because in the studys they did only do 1-3 month trial periods and not 6-12+ month periods.

so going down and finding out the lowest dose which yields the expected results might be a good practice. but check with your doctor first what he has to say about it.

i was on insulin injections, i went slowly down, and realized i didnt need them at all anymore. doctor said i should NOT go down, because sugar was fine when i took insulin... i tried by myself and now i saved me a lot of side effects, like weight gaining and worsening insulin resistance.
... well kinda i am contradicting my previous suggestion to ask your doctor first... but you should, because some medications, i imagine like heart medications, it could be actually deadly to go down. so i would ask for what the worst would be happening. for diabetes medications you can always go down, and later up if sugar goes out of control.