beta blockers and ADD stimulants – counteractive effects?

[Anonymous]

Hi,

I was recently diagnosed with moderate ADD at the ‘ripe’ age of 48. I had been taking blood pressure meds for a few years at that point. However, it was recommended that I see a heart specialist before I began taking any stimulants. My heart checked out fine, but the cardio specialist said that I should reduce the amount of Metoprolol I had been taking. His reasoning was that the Metoprolol, a beta blocker, would have a counteractive effect to any stimulants that I was taking. (I am currently on Adderal). Actually, he recommended stopping Metoprolol altogether and trying other classes of BP meds. But I had already tried all other available classes, and the beta blocker is what seems to work best. So, he accepted the fact that I had to take at least a reduced amount of Metoprolol. I did what he said but believe that my BP has been slowly creeping up.

I finally checked back with my primary care doctor. He essentially refuted what the cardio doctor said: that keeping my Metoprolol WOULD NOT have a counteractive effect to the Adderall. I didn’t quite get if he was talking about beta blockers/ADD stimulants in general or my particular sitiuation. I realize that any ADD meds I take should not be at the expense of my blood pressure.

My question is: Do beta blockers have a counteractive effect to ADD stimulants? If so, in what way?

Thanks for this forum.

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[Anonymous]

I’m certainly not qualified to comment but will anyway. 😉

I had concerns about my BP possibly rising when I started taking meds (Concerta 72 mg) since I had already been taking 2 blood pressure meds for what had seemed like forever. Well, BP meds since I was about 28 and I was 52 when diagnosed with ADHD. I take atenolol and also a diuretic.

My BP perhaps did go up a tad but it has always had minor ups and downs over the years. At each particular rise, I was able to attribute the rise to periods of extreme stress I was under each time because the BP would always slowly fall back down to an acceptable level when the stressors disappeared.

Have you got a good pharmacist? Sometimes they are great at finding out that kind of info for you get conflicting info from your MDs.

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