Has Anyone Taken Both Provigil and Nuvigil?

I just started provigil and so far the side effects have been sooo much better. I don't feel fidgety and it doesn't make me more tired like nuvigil did. So far I feel a lot better on it than I did nuvigil. The only side effect I have noticed is headaches but to me they are worth it

switched me to Nuvigil—& voila! my extremely-detailed, emotionally-complex stories resumed. Nuvigil allowed me to retain my ”imaginative imperative”.

Other than that, no difference; no headaches (as others have mentioned). Hope you are enjoying a brighter, more wakeful life with either of these drugs.

In 2010 the original patent for Provigil (the trade name for the compound modafinil) was owned by Cephalon Inc., this was due to expire on October that year. If this were the only patent protection Cephalon had on Provigil it would have meant a huge loss of income/profits for them. It is common that within the first few weeks of losing patent protection ("exclusivity") sales profits from a drug can drop by 80-90%. Given that Provigil was one of the most lucrative products for Cephalon, around 40% of the entire profit of the company came from Provigil, hence this would have been disasterous for them as a business.
Pharma companies are not silly businesses though and saw this coming from a long way off, which is why, in 1994 already they had applied for another patent on Provigil, which was granted in 1997 and should have given them about 15 more years of protection. This patent was not taken out on the actual compound structure of the drug however, rather on the size of the particles of the already existing compound. They found that it was more effective when the particles were smaller, and used this as the basis for a new patent.
However, when the original patent ran out various generic drug manufacturers who believed that the second patent was based on a weak argument (ie they believed that defining the size of the particles was not a novel enough idea to be given a patent for) decided to challenge the rights of Cephalon to exclusivity based on this patent. Instead of allowing this case to be decided in court, Cephalon agreed to settle with these generics manufacturers for around $200 million, under the condition that they recieve six further years of exclusivity on the sale of Modafinil.
This is where NuVigil comes in. Cephalon had developed NuVigil (at least in a business sense) for the purpose of continuing to recieve high profits from the same group of patients after their exclusivity rights ran out on Provigil.
The drug NuVigil is the same compound as ProVigil, but it is what is called the "levorotary enantiomer". Basically the compound when produced comes in two shapes which are mirror images of each other, the relevant part of this here is that they will bind in slightly different ways to the receptors in a brain even though the 'ingredients' are the same. The standard version of modafinil contains both sides, or both of the shapes if you will. Nuvigil (or Armodafinil) contains only one of these shapes - hence the 'levorotary'. So in actual fact Provigil (modafinil) actually contains Nuvigil (armodafinil), as well as the opposite shaped version.
The difference between these two drugs then, whilst not huge, is enough to justify strong patent protection. Exactly what Cephalon needed in order to avoid generic imitation. The problem was that many people had already been taking Provigil with a lot of success. They needed to 'migrate' their existing customers over from Provigil to Nuvigil before the generic version of Provigil (modafinil) came out and their customers left them for the cheaper, and exactly the same, version.
So within the six years that they bought themselves through the settlement Cephalon began this process, in large part by increasing the price of Provigil dramatically (by 74% I believe) such that the new version Nuvigil actually ended up being cheaper. There were likely deals going on with insurance companies and health care collectives, to promote/make compulsory the use of the branded and/or new version but I am not sure of the details so will make no specific claims about that. The marketing of Provigil stopped in 2011 and the heavy marketing for Nuvigil began shortly afterwards. The idea being to get all of the customers they could to switch to Nuvigil before the generic versions of Provigil became available. This seems to have worked to a reasonable degree, and it appears that many of you have experienced the effects (at least financially) of these tricky moves.

I am in a position where I do not/can not work outside my home, but if I ever was forced to, for whatever reason, I might be able to handle to mental, ie; concentration, alertness, focus part of it, but definitely not the physical aspects of a real job!

I do hope you are doing well, now seven years post your original question, or at least as well as you possibly can be given your health issues. I do so hate to see anyone suffering! "CURES" are what I continuously hope and pray for, for all us afflicted with one, or multiple issues. Be well, Thor 283!!

Consumers are protected financially by putting an expiration date (years) on the drug’s patent. It’s “coming off patent” which is where the generics come in.
So who gets to do the initial generic version? It’s not an easy process to buy the rights to do the exact chemical structure of the Brand name. If it’s different, it won’t be governmentally approved to go up against the other pharmas all trying to get the generic version.
Here is where the lawyers and lobbyists are necessary to get in the game. You can imagine the cost on that part !
The initial Brand pharmacy is about to lose their exclusivity. All they need to do is tweak the chemical structure and prove that it’s more effective. Ex... They develop it for pediatric use or a better delivery system and the generics are held off and the clock starts ticking again. What does it mean to consumers? They get to continue paying for high priced drugs.
This is what happened with the development of Nuvigil. It was just different enough to postpone the patent date.
I hope I explained this properly or if someone knows differently, please comment.
:-)
Big bucks again...