On call: Pseudoephedrine and blood pressure

On call

pseudoephedrine,phenylpropanolamine,

To find out, a team of U.S. military doctors reviewed 24 trials that evaluated the blood pressure and heart rate of 1,285 patients who were given pseudoephedrine. The medication did increase blood pressure, but the effect was minimal; on average, the systolic blood pressure increased by only 1 millimeter of mercury (mm Hg) and the diastolic pressure even less. The same was true of heart rate, which rose less than three beats a minute. And patients with well-controlled hypertension showed similarly minor effects from the medication. Finally, sustained-release formulations of pseudoephedrine had less impact than immediate-release forms, and lower doses had less effect than higher doses.

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