exactly what my doctor is having me do, reducing atenolol slowly over several weeks.
I just went from sotolol to atenolol and I guess the dose wasn't comparable and my heart went all wacky. You can not just stop taking a beta blocker. You need to call your doctor and see what he advises you to do. He may advise you to start back at a reduced dose and taper yourself slowly off the drug.
Hi
I stopped Atenolol 3 weeks ago and I had to do this very carefully.
I was on 50mg and this had to be tapered down to 25mg every day for 2 weeks then 25mg every other day for two weeks. Even after that my heart was all wacky for a few days.
I have never heard of any Beta Blocker that you can take as and when needed as with all Heart Meds I should imagine they take time to build up to work. I remember when I first took Atenolol it took a good few weeks of taking that daily before I saw any reduction in my PVC's after a second heart ablation for SVT and that was at 50mg.
Please take care.
Never stop a BB (or any med for that matter) without discussing with your doc. BBs in particular though. You are experiencing a rebound effect.
This is one of the reasons I'm against taking any sort of medication for problems that don't require the meds, you become dependent on that med.
It should eventually go back to normal.
If you want to make yourself more comfortable, you would have to go back on the med. Then you would try to taper slowly off it to avoid the rebound. But you need to discuss this with your doctor and you'll need to hear the lecture about stopping it A.M.A (against medical advice). :-)