coming off of medications

I have my AV node ablation in about a week. I am curious about people that have been on medications for a long period of time and what it is like to come off of them. I am currently on flecainide 100mg twice a day, Toprol XL 50 mg twice a day, midodrine 10 mg three times a day, and we just added back in Digoxin 0.25mg once a day. I am most concerned with coming off that much Toprol and flecainide. I have been on those for almost 5 years. When I have come off these for my EP studies I have gotten horrible tachycardia as well as chest pain. I know that the tachycardia will obviously not be there, but I am concerned about the headache and chest pain. Has anyone had problems coming off medications such as these?

4 Comments

DRUGS

by pete - 2009-07-19 02:07:29

I think you will be much better off after your AV node ablation. There will be no more tachycardia as you know. You should not need that medication. You can expect an immediate improvement and a further improvement over time in your heart function. I am talking from personal experience. Good luck. When you feel up to it let ys know how it went. Cheers Peter

other symptoms

by Tracey_E - 2009-07-19 06:07:51

I don't know for sure, but it sounds like the chest pain and headaches are side effects of the tachycardia, so they should not be a problem when you go off them now. You should find you feel a lot better without the meds because they all have side effects of their own. Good luck!

Toprol

by Tracey_E - 2009-07-20 07:07:48

It's not hard to come off of, it just has to be done very gradually. My mom has been weaned down to the lowest dose for her afib, she's feeling great.

toprol

by sam78 - 2009-07-20 12:07:12

I have been warned that coming off toprol is hard to do. Have people on here just rapidly stopped theirs? Along time ago they told me I would have to slowly wean off over a couple weeks but since we got to the extreme of the AV node ablation I wasnt sure it if will mattter. The one that worries me is the effect on the atria because this is my problem area and i dont want my atria to be flipping away while my ventricle is nice and slow.

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