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DiscussionAnyone have experience coming off of 12.5 mg of metropol?
Heart Rhythm Conditions | Last Active: 6 hours ago | Replies (62)Comment receiving replies
Replies to "@ekiss metoprolol cannot be stopped cold turkey. And the pill can only be split if it..."
@vjs003
Thank you so very much for your concern. I understand and have been monitoring the situation as now, I cut down to 25 mg ( yes there is a score line on my pills) and every other day. I was part of the Athletas monitoring system where my daily BP/heart rate results were automatically sent to my cardiologist's office, so I have a fairly professional BP monitor which I use daily. So currently, with the cut back, I don't seem to have any rebound effects and feel much better. I will continue to take 25 mg every other day for another week or so unless anything changes. Unfortunately, I am in a midst of being somewhat "abandoned" as I had to leave my cardiologist due to very bad practices, i.e. unreturned calls, not being able to get hold of him with problems, etc. My new Cardiologist's closest appointment is scheduled for December 17th. My current PCP is on vacation until August 28th and none else/substitute got back from her office to advise me. Hence, I am on my own for now. I am glad that I have found this site and able to read other people's experiences with this drug. Thanks again for your outreach and kind advice. I will be closely monitoring all of my symptoms and BP/heart rate daily and will act accordingly. I am in Los Angeles and my stay with AFib at Cedars Sinai was excellent but finding an available, reliable, caring cardiologist is an other matter entirely, and it doesn't help that a large number of the best specialists went concierge which my poor Medicare won't cover. I am very optimistic though and believe that things will get better once I am able to secure a new care provider, cardiologist.
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@vjs003 Well, according to the electrophysiologist I saw a number of years ago, it really isn't necessary to gradually wean off a small dose of metoprolol, ie, 12.5 mg/day would be a small dose. He didn't define what a small dose would be, other than the examples of 12.5 mg or even 25 mg/day. I was stopping metoprolol at the time under his care, and switching over to diltiazem to see if this would improve my bradycardia and still control the tachycardia. I had to taper off gradually from a dose of 150 mg/day, and his instructions were to do this over a three week period, ie, from 150mg to 100 on week 1, 100 to 50mg on week 2, and 50 to 25mg on week 3, then none at all ( though I was switching to dilatiazem, which as it turned out neither controlled the tachycardia or stopped the bradycardia). I did experience some of what I'd consider rebound effects, which included feeling "hyped up and jittery" for about 2 weeks. My blood pressure was still controlled by the other meds I took, and the tachycardia, well, that'd been a part of my life for quite a while anyway, but well controlled by the metoprolol. Without it, well, it wasn't pretty since the diltiazem didn't do much to control it.
I know the metoprolol package insert states pretty much the same thing you've listed in your post, but the package insert does not indicate at what dosage of metoprolol tapering off the medication should occur when it's being discontinued. As it's been often repeated, one shouldn't discontinue a medication without the knowledge, instructions and guidance of the prescriber, and I think guessing at how much to continue tapering off metoprolol ad infinitum is a sure fire way to drive oneself crazy. I've seen comments from people trying to taper off an initial 25 mg/day metoprolol dose by half, then half again, then one more half, and so on till it seems they're trying to cut a salt-grain size pill particle by half yet again and wondering why they can't find that sliver after their pill cutter made short work of it- all the while going on and on about the miserable "side effects" they're still perceiving and complaining that the metoprolol is the worst drug on the planet. That's got to be frustrating for them, and if those "side effects" are real and continue, it'd be better to investigate their real causes and not continue to blame them on a drug that was discontinued some time before.
Seems to me the best way to go about tapering off a drug like metoprolol is to ask for and follow specific instructions from the prescriber, starting with the dose the person is taking, exactly by how much and how long to continue the tapering off process.