Asthma and Beta Blockers

[KathyP]

Hello Everyone;

I have been on a beta-blocker for almost 2 months now. I am on Toprol XL, 25mg per day. I have asthma which is controlled with Advair, which my doctor slightly increased when I started the toprol. I was really worried about the effects beta blockers have on asthma. Once I got used to the initial adjustment to Toprol XL I was feeling better and my heart settled down quite a bit.

But, the strangest thing happened to me today. Usually when I come into contact with animals I get severely asthmatic even when I use Advair. My family and I will be adopting a new puppy soon so we decided to go to see the 3 week old litter. The house we were in has both dogs living in it as well as the puppies. Even with the dogs the house seemed very clean. Before the beta blocker I would have been totally asthmatic after 10 minutes. But, I was amazed that I played with the puppies and their mom for over an hour and not once had a asthmatic reaction. I can't tell you how excited I was about this. I love dogs and to be in a room with so many of them, and being right down on the floor with them without having an asthma attack was very exciting for me, but unusual. Is there anyone out there that has had any similar reaction.

I asked my doctor several times about asthma and beta blockers. I told him how worried I was. He told me that certain beta blockers at low doses don't have any effect on asthma. This proved true for me. I hope maybe this can help someone else.

So if there is anyone out there that might be afraid of beta blockers with asthma and haven't tried them yet, please talk to you doctor about all of the different beta blockers that are out there and which low dose can work for you. I have found that beta blockers are a great tool to slowing the tachycardia and are well worth it.

KathyP

[Jen]

Hi, I can only speak from my own experience, but I was also able to handle beta-blockers with my asthma. I discussed it with my cardiologist and pulmonologist and decided that it would be best to be on it. Without it, my heart rate was consistently over 150, even while resting, so that wore me out pretty quickly. If I remember right, there are different types of beta-blockers, some of which have less action on the lungs (they might have been called cardio-selective - sorry, it's been awhile since I had that conversation ).

One tip that I learned is that certain types of rescue inhalers can make you feel like your heart is racing more than others. After blacking out after using albuterol, I decided to ask my pulmonologist if there were any other options, as I didn't want to be fainting and having an asthma attack at the same time. I was told to try Maxair (pirbuterol) and I haven't had that racy heart feeling using it. Some people are more sensitive to albuterol than others, is what I was told. Hope this helps.

~Jen