What should the average onset time and effective duration be for this drug?

11 May 2011

If your talking about vicodin the half-life is 4 hrs, so a total of 6-8 hrs before you need another one.

11 May 2011

monster0411, I take hydrocodone10/325 myself & have learned a little trick that helps me get a quicker reaction time. Don't know why this works, but seems to everytime. I am on a 4 hourly dose right now becaue of surgery, but maintain a usual dose of every six hours. I take mine on an empty stomach; wait about 15 minutes, & then eat something! Whether it be a few crackers or a cookie or dinner it doesn't matter. It seems letting the drug disolve on my empty stomach & then filling it up gets it to kick in fast! Don't know if that works for anyone else, but when I'm jonesing for that next dose because my pain is so bad, it really works. Hope this helps you out...

11 May 2011

Hey monster,

The onset has to do with the peak time to reach maximum blood level which for hydrocodone with ibuprofen is approximately 1.7 to 1.8 hours. The effective duration has to do with the elimination half life which is 4.5 hours and a plasma half life of 2.2 hours so it remains effective for 4 to 6 hours after taking the dose. You can read about the pharmokenitics of this drug at the following website:

http://www.drugs.com/pro/hydrocodone-and-ibuprofen.html

Hope this helps,

Laurie