High prolactin levels alone should not be a reason to stop a medication; there is always a balance of risk/benefit that should be carefully considered. There are a couple consequences of high prolactin levels; the levels 'feed back' on the hypothalamus and affect the release of other pituitary hormones. The primary effects that I am aware of are on the levels of 'sex hormones', so that high prolactin inhibits release of the hormones FSH and LH in women and stop the woman's periods (not a concern for your son!), and the other effect is reducing bone mineralization-- i.e. reducing the calcium deposits in bone, making the person more susceptible to osteoporosis some day. To look into these issues, perhaps your son's doctor would refer you to an endocrinologist for evaluation of the risk side of the risk/reward equation.
If risperidone must be stopped, there are many alternatives, but I suspect you have tried some of them. Risperidone is in a family of medications that includes Geodon (ziprasidone) and Abilify (aripiprazole) and two other medications that I wouldn't recommend as highly; either of the two that I mentioned may be even safer alternatives. Risperidone is a 'new'
antipsychotic, but is similar to the old
antipsychotics... and so it carries some risks that are associated with the older drugs.
