Hyperbolic tapering, with guided support
For SSRIs and SNRIs like Effexor, Lexapro and Zoloft. Start by meeting a tapering clinician to see if you're eligible.
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Answer a few questions online
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Meet a tapering clinician to see if you're eligible
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If you're eligible, start your taper
Getting started is simple
Three steps. You only continue if it's right for you.
Answer a few questions
About your medication and past attempts, online.
Meet a tapering clinician
A $99 video visit to see if you're eligible.
Start your taper
If you're eligible: a personalized plan, custom doses and ongoing support.
What is hyperbolic tapering?
At higher doses, cutting a few milligrams changes the drug's effect only a little. At lower doses, the same few milligrams changes it a lot, which is why the last part of a taper is often the hardest. Hyperbolic tapering makes each cut smaller as the dose gets lower, so each step feels more even.
Why hyperbolic tapering is hard to do alone
The doses don't exist off the shelf
Late-stage steps can be fractions of a milligram. Most tablets can't be split that small. Compounded liquids and capsules can.
The pace has to move with you
A good schedule slows down, holds or pauses based on how you feel. Your clinician adjusts it with you.
Withdrawal can look like relapse
A clinician trained in tapering can help tell the difference, so a rough patch doesn't send you back to a higher dose.
Looking for a schedule or calculator?
Your schedule depends on your medication, dose and history. Ours are built by a clinician, not a calculator.
Hyperbolic tapering, from people doing it
Members tapering with custom doses and a clinician by their side.
Tapering Venlafaxine
Tapering Sertraline
Tapering Venlafaxine
Tapering Sertraline
Tapering Citalopram
Tapering Fluoxetine
Start with a $99 evaluation
A 45-minute video visit to see if you're eligible. If you continue, membership is $225/month and includes:
Personalized hyperbolic taper plan
Monthly video visits with your clinician
Messaging between visits
Access to custom compounded prescriptions
Peer support and lifestyle classes
Pay with your HSA or FSA card
Hyperbolic tapering, with a clinician who gets it
9/10 patients have tried to get off their antidepressant before finding Outro Health
93% of patients trust Outro Health clinicians with their taper more than their previous prescriber
7x: hyperbolic tapering has a significantly higher stopping success rate than standard protocols
95% of patients had a better experience tapering with Outro Health
World-leading experts in safe deprescribing
If your last taper attempts didn't work, it probably wasn't your fault. 9/10 long-term antidepressant users experience withdrawal symptoms, which make stopping difficult. We use the first science-based method to limit withdrawal symptoms.
Not your average tapering experience
Most psychiatric care is built around starting medications. We built Outro Health around stopping them.
Standard care
Cuts using whatever tablet sizes the pharmacy stocks leading to withdrawal symptoms.
Dose reductions aligned to neurobiology, per the Maudsley Deprescribing Guidelines.
Most prescribers don't write for compounded medications. You taper using whatever the manufacturer makes.
Liquid and capsule formulations let us calibrate each step to a fraction of a milligram.
Psychiatric training covers starting medications, with little formal instruction on stopping them.
Clinicians who specialize in coming off psychiatric medications, grounded in the deprescribing literature.
Symptoms often misread as the original condition returning, leading to re-prescription, higher doses, or more medications.
We distinguish withdrawal from relapse, adjust the pace, and keep moving forward instead of backward.
Reductions happen on appointment cadence, often faster than the nervous system can adjust.
We slow down, hold steady, or pause whenever your body needs us to—without restarting from zero.
Symptoms between appointments wait for the next 15-minute slot, sometimes weeks away.
Care team messaging plus regular check-ins throughout your taper—not just at appointments.
FAQs
Questions about hyperbolic tapering and how Outro does it.
Outro Health provides flexible, medically-supervised tapering plan with gradual dose reductions tailored just for you. Our hyperbolic tapering method, where reductions become progressively smaller, gently minimizes nervous system disruption and withdrawal discomfort. We personalize your tapering plan based on your response, preferences, and what's happening in your life.
Safe antidepressant deprescribing requires a comprehensive approach that is often difficult for an individual prescriber to provide due to the time required. It also requires up-to-date knowledge on the latest techniques in tapering antidepressants that are not yet widely taught in the United States. Think of Outro Health as a specialist in tapering.
At Outro Health, we walk with you every step of the way. Our specialized, high-touch care team takes time to get to know you and your goals, and provides an advanced, individualized approach to tapering off antidepressants informed by the latest guidance and clinical evidence. Through Outro Health’s app, your symptoms and progress are continuously monitored by your provider, who can reach out to offer coping strategies or adapt your care plan accordingly. If you have questions or concerns that arise in between appointments, your Outro Health provider is available via 1-to-1 chat.
Hyperbolic tapering (sometimes called the Horowitz-Taylor method) is based on the fact that as antidepressant dose goes up, drug action on brain cells increases, but not in equal steps. Higher dosages have less and less additional influence – a decreasing return on investment. The graph showing this is called a hyperbolic curve (goes up faster at low doses, and flatter at higher doses).
Tapering based on this method gradually reduces the drug following this natural curve, with the size of dose reduction getting smaller as the dosage gets closer to 0mg. These very low doses are difficult to make up with commonly available tablets, so compounded medications become important. To learn more, speak with an Outro Health clinician by scheduling your evaluation.
Many people have difficulties when they try to go off antidepressants. Our team of expertly trained clinicians will develop a tailored tapering program, informed by the latest scientific evidence and designed to minimize withdrawal effects - even for these people who have tried to stop before.
We currently offer taper management for antidepressant medications. You can see the full list here.
We are making preparations to expand to other psychotropic medications like benzodiazepines, which also follow the hyperbolic tapering method.
See if hyperbolic tapering is right for you
Answer a few questions online, then meet a clinician trained in hyperbolic tapering.
