Toprol to Atenolol

[hcmmt]

I'm kind of between a rock and a hard place here, and I'm on a time table with only a week's worth of Toprol left.

I'm getting on the horn tomorrow and see if I can get a hold of the cardiologist I've seen once where I live now, but he's now in a town 125miles away and his charts are in the town I live in(he use to commute once a week). I've also heard a rumor that he's since retired.

Here's my problem, I got laid off in February and of course lost my health insurance, but thankfully get unemployment(barely enough to squeak by on). I went to my local county health clinic on Monday to see what prescription assistance I could get. Long story short with them, it'll take 4-6 weeks to hear back from the manufacturer to know if I qualify or not, but it's apparently based off the previous years earnings, not the fact that I'm unemployed and have no insurance. I voiced my concerns about the cost of my Toprol to the lady who heads this project and she decided I could go from Toprol to Atenolol by just glancing at my chart because it would be cheaper. I could be mistaken, but as far as I know, she has no medical degree, she just handles prescription help. So she runs off and comes back with a script for 2 100mg Atenolol once a day(currently I take 1 200mg Toprol XL). She rambles off the price, which I think was like 6$ for a month's supply, where my Toprol was running me close to 70$

The more I think about this, the more I don't like it. Toprol has worked great for me so far and I've been on it since 2001 with only fatigue as the long term side effect. My primary care doc said if it works, don't do a thing in 07 when the generic came out. The cardiologist I saw said keep doing what you're doing and come back in 3 years.

So that's pretty much where I am right now. I'm going to call the pharmacy and see what the generic Toprol runs without insurance to compare to the Atenolol. My biggest concern is does Atenolol work better than Toprol, or not as good; meaning would 200mg of it be equivalent to 200mg Toprol? and then there's the issue of side effects if it's not working like it should be, right now, I really don't have the funds to make a bunch of ER and Doc visits to get medication straightened out. Technically it should be the same, but is the amount of medicine released the same between 2 100mg pills and 1 200mg pill?

Any thoughts or experiences?

[Pam Alexson]

The switch may be an adjusting curve for you for a couple weeks and it may well cause some increase in symptoms, I understand the financial part as I do not have RX coverage. I had been switched from Topral Xl to Topral to atenolol many years ago for similar reasons : financial. I did well after some adjustment period with increase in fatigue and feeling worse for a short time. But the doses had to be tweaked according to my adjusting symptoms and my BP readings., as my body adjusted. I remembered feeling dizzy a lot in the beginning of the change but that did go away and it was not related to it being too much medication just a change. If you do change .. be sure you are monitored closely over the several weeks that it will take your nervous system to adjust and you checking your own BP value each day several times a day and writing it down for your doctor would also be very helpful. If you do this and you are dizzy do not drive until the dizziness fades if that is a symptom. Remember the warnings that are on the bottles are there for that symptom.

Also XL is given for the whole day coverage.. if you go to a regular dose strength you may have to take it 2 times a day to cover the whole day, as my symptoms and those of many here increase as the drug effect wears off with regular strength. When I took the XL, interesting enough that was given to me 2 times a day as it did not cover the whole day if I took it 1 time a day.
Med changes from XL to regular to generic to total switch often requires these adjustments.. it can be done with good medical oversight and often times the original motivation for the switch that you did it for helps as the mindset is truly a contributing factor to how one adjusts to medication and changes. "YOU know, Where there is a will, there is a way," thinking does work in the sense of our psychological perception attitude. That's why the placebo effect is a real entity for medication taking.

Also you may want to work w/ your doctor to get on the free med program from the manufacturer of the med if you do not want to go through all this and your doc does not want you to switch. It will require a little research on your part and forms for your doctor to fill out and in the meantime do not be afraid to discuss the financial aspect with your doctor and ask them to get or give you samples that they more then likely have in their office. The drug reps for the manufacturers are always bringing by freebies for the docs to hand out to their patients.

If you do get on atenolol it is very, very cheap on the walmart $4.oo med program. I switched my CCB to one that they had as well, due to financial and it worked, got my dad's doctor to change my dad's( he's 91 almost 92) anti-cholesterol med to one on the walmart list and he adjusted and his cholesterol is lower then it ever was on the expensive med for same thing.

Good luck..

Pam

[Jall]

In December I switched from the generic Toprol XL back to atenolol. I made the switch because an echo showed my gradient was up, and basically the doctor and I said, what the ****, switch back to Atenolol which I had been on years earlier and see if it did any good. He uped the dose 25mg at the same time. A more recent echo showed a small improvement. Don't know if it was the switch that did any good, but I did not really notice any long tem difference. There might have been a time for about a month when I felt more tired. I do have to do the split dose deal (morning and pm) which is a bit of a pain. Having said that, I am sure all people react differently and you need to decide if the added cost of the Toprol is worth benefit. For me, its not.

Good luck on getting back on track jobwise and insurancewise!

Jall

[hcmmt]

So, the health clinic that wrote me the prescription for Atenolol wouldn't tell me anything without seeing me, even though they wrote it on Monday when I was there.

The cardiologist's office refused to tell me anything because I haven't been seen in over a year, yet the doc told me not to come back for 3. The only thing she would say is that Atenolol is a generic for Toprol XL. I was under the impression that these two were completely different drugs, but in the same family?

The only other thing she said was to call the health clinic and see what they would tell me, and if they wouldn't help, to call her back; this after I already told her they wouldn't do anything, and my primary doc is gone for the week.