stopping the medication

Hello and welcome,

No-one here can tell you to stop taking these drugs. We are not doctors. You need to go to your GP and discuss it all with him/her.

It is perfectly possible to come off Metformin when your blood sugars are low enough and stable, but yours don't seem to be stable enough just yet. You could control your diabetes entirely with diet, but you would need to read up and learn about how to do this. Cutting right down on carbohydrates would be a start. What sort of meals do you generally eat?

I have be able to stop the statins with the gidence of my HFN .. It was a very gradual process with lots of blood tests to see everything was ok.
So please don't just stop taking your medication without the help of your medical team.

Definitely make an appointment and discuss the concerns about your medication with your Dr. Many of us here have been able to come off our medication and are able to control with diet alone which is great but you have to make sure you aren't compromising your health in doing so.

Never come off prescribed medicines without talking to your doctor first

You'd be a mug to stop them. Apart from the diabetes, the atenolol and ramipril are for high blood pressure. Stop them who knows where you BP could go. Non compliance with BP meds can lead to heart attacks, strokes and death. Is that what you want?

I think the important thing is to know what each drug is for and whether your medical state calls for them? Metformin helps if you are overweight and at other times it helps a bit with blood sugar and is very safe. Statins have nothing to do with diabetes and are for high cholesterol. If your cholesterol is not that high and your HDL/LDL ratio is good then discuss coming off them with the nurse. Ramipril is for high blood pressure. Discuss what your current readings are and what dose if any you need with the nurse. I have no idea what atenolol is.

Atenelol is a beta blocker, used to treat angina and high blood pressure @Daibell.

Beta blockers have to be tailed off rather than stopped abruptly @caseyc. You need to review your medication with your G.P. rather than stopping it all.

I was taking 4 blood pressure tablets for a while. I decided to come off of them one at a time and chose which one I wanted to stop first and then spoke to my GP who agreed each time. Interestingly I didn't really have to ask about stopping the last one ( a beta blocker), when my blood pressure was low enough my GP just told me to stop taking it, no tailing off. I was only taking a low dose though and had been getting breathless when walking fast.

That is why the Op should consult his G.P. @zand

http://patient.info/health/beta-blockers

Other considerations
Do not stop taking a beta-blocker suddenly without first consulting a doctor. When you take a beta-blocker regularly, the body becomes used to it. So, suddenly stopping taking it can sometimes cause problems such as:#

• The sensation of rapid, irregular or forceful heartbeats (palpitations).
• A rise in blood pressure.
• A return (recurrence) of angina pains.

If you do need to stop taking a beta-blocker then your doctor may advise a gradual reduction in dose.

I can't, and shouldn't advise you to stop taking prescribed medicines, but if my husband were in your situation and asking my advice, I think I would raise the following questions:

On the assumption that you really needed these drugs when you started taking them, what has changed since they were first prescribed? Have you made serious improvements to your diet? Have you lost a lot of weight? Are you taking much more exercise? In other words, has the situation changed?

If the basic situation (your lifestyle and weight) has changed, have you any evidence that the drugs are now causing an over effect, e.g. your blood pressure is frequently lower than necessary or advisable, perhaps you go dizzy on standing.

Did you actually need these drugs in the first place? I'm referring here, primarily to the statin. There are strong arguments against taking statins and supporting the view that cholesterol should not be lowered, except in extreme or special cases. You should, perhaps, familiarise yourself with these arguments and come to your own decision.

Should any drugs be discontinued, are you willing and in a position to monitor any changes. For example, monitoring your own blood pressure and blood sugar levels and recording these and any other changes in your health. It is only by doing this, that you will truly know what the effects of the drugs really are.

Whatever you decide, I would strongly recommend only withdrawing one drug at a time, otherwise you will not know what is causing what effect. There are also strong arguments for tapering off drugs, rather than sudden total withdrawal, e.g. taking one a day, rather than two, for several weeks.

I particularly note that you are taking a beta blocker, possibly for angina. Your situation may be more serious than the "bog standard" metabolic syndrome, which can be alleviated by lifestyle changes. You should consult your doctor before altering your medication.
Sally

@catherinecherub I agree the OP should consult his GP and whilst I didn't actually say it, that is what I implied by saying that is what I had done myself.

I also wasn't questioning what you advised re tailing off the drug, just expressing that I wasn't told that by my GP. I remember it more clearly now I have had time to think about it. It was about a year ago and I was on 5 mg bisoprolol (which I had been taking for irregular heartbeat, fast heart beat and high blood pressure.) I asked if I could stop taking warfarin and he said Yes, then I asked if I could halve the dose of beta blockers because I was feeling faint when my BP went too low. He told me to just stop taking them as I didn't need them anymore.

Like I said, it's interesting that my GP didn't seem to know there was a problem with stopping beta blockers suddenly. I'm not surprised though, I have always had better advice from this forum than from my GPs.

Don't most pharmacies offer a drug/side effects/combination reviews? Maybe have a word with your pharmacist. I often find they are willing to spend more time with me and explain things better than doctors have time to.

caseyc said:

Thanks everyone for your responses. Am so pleased you all care. Sometimes this thing feels like a horrible curse and I'm the only one going through it. Of course, I'm not! Hate to think I'm pumping all these drugs into myself every day and just wondered what would happen if I rebelled and stopped them all. Sometimes it feels like I want to strike out and just stop. I will speak to my doctor, of course I will. Not stupid enough to do something rash and life-threatening...just feeling the hideous burden of taking 7 or 8 pills a day...doesn't feel right, but if it's saving my life, they...hey...

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I know the feeling, and I would bet that most of here do too. I take a lot more than 8 pills a day, but I accept that I need to. It took many years to reach that point.

One thing I would like to raise is the possibility of obstructive sleep apnoea syndrome. Needing two or more drugs for hypertension is a clue, as is diabetes. You might want to ask your doctor to refer you for an overnight sleep study. Sometimes treating this condition can enable people to reduce some of their meds. Along with making them feel a whole lot better and potentially saving their life.

caseyc said:

Thanks everyone for your responses. Am so pleased you all care. Sometimes this thing feels like a horrible curse and I'm the only one going through it. Of course, I'm not! Hate to think I'm pumping all these drugs into myself every day and just wondered what would happen if I rebelled and stopped them all. Sometimes it feels like I want to strike out and just stop. I will speak to my doctor, of course I will. Not stupid enough to do something rash and life-threatening...just feeling the hideous burden of taking 7 or 8 pills a day...doesn't feel right, but if it's saving my life, they...hey...

Click to expand...

Well it can be done if you are careful and work with your GP. Losing 3 stones in weight has helped me to leave the drugs behind, but of course not everyone can do that because there are other health factors to consider. I built up to maybe 7 drugs at once and have taken 6 years to gradually stop them. The only one I take now is a new one for depression and I have recently halved the dose of that (after consulting my counsellor and GP)

Like someone else said, if I were you I would stay on the metformin because it's an old, well tried and tested drug which can be beneficial. I would still be taking it myself if my GP would still prescribe it.