Author: Dr. William Rassman

I am a 23 year old male who has been using propecia for one year. I wanted some clarification on whether or not propecia can have an effect on brain function. I have read various sites that claim it does. Some users post confusing scientific data related to rats and state that it proves their allegations. They claim that propecia has caused, “brain fog, memory problems, aniexty, and depression” to name a few side effects.

In your expert opinion, can daily 1mg doses of finasteride change brain function? Specifically, change GABA function. Am I at risk if I continue to take the medication? If not, why do so many users claim to be negatively effected by this drug?

Please note that the use of the Internet for researching such reports may be biased towards sensationalism or focusing on the unusual. The reports of mood changes with Propecia (finasteride) seem credible, after all, since it does cause hormone changes in the body. For example, we have seen major mood alterations in women with mild hormone fluctuations. Propecia will alter hormone balances and this could be claimed to impact brain function, because I would think that mood alterations are connected with brain function. With regard to “brain fog” (confusion, forgetfulness) though, well, I really don’t know what it is that you are addressing and there is no way to really know what it does to the brain in any meaningful study that is currently available in the medical literature.

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Dear Doctor,
after 6 years of Propecia, I have started to take also 1mg of Dutasteride daily. Would the daily combination of finastride and dutasteride run the risk of making both drugs ineffective?

I would not suggest that you take both medications at the same time — as both are prescription medications, you should be discussing that with your doctor. That being said… no, they won’t cancel each other out. These medications work roughly the same way on the mechanism for hair loss. There is a suggestion that dutasteride is a bit more powerful than finasteride, but there are more side effects and the dose in dutasteride to get a better DHT block is high (2.5 mg/day). There are reports that these higher doses may cause infertility in some men and we do not know if this is reversible. At this time, dutasteride is not FDA approved for the treatment of hair loss. For more on dutasteride, see past posts here.

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Doctor,
I have read that Dutasteride is metabolised by the CYP3A4 enzyme. I am taking Acomplia (obesity treatment drug) which is a CYP3A4 inhibitor and I have read that has been proved that, in combination with CYP3A4 inhibitor, Dutasteride level in the blood have raised Would this mean than Dutasteride would be ineffective in my case? Would the same be for Propecia?

Thanks very much

Drugs like this (metabolized by CYP3A4) may impact liver metabolism and therefore impact the length of action of other drugs in your body. Take note of the following diseases: impaired liver or kidney function. For finasteride, the presence of epilepsy may put you at risk with this drug. It drug may have side effects with antifungal, HIV, antibiotics, antidepressive medications.

I found nothing about dutasteride, but I would imagine the same rules apply as discussed above.

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