How Do Asthma Medications Affect Blood Pressure?

Do the medications used to treat Asthma affect Blood Pressure? There is no one answer on this question. In every day reality the answer could be both: Yes and No. MDIs or Metered Dose Inhalers are familiar and commonly prescribed drugs for asthma treatment. If you have asthma MDIs are a familiar part of your treatment routine.

How Do Metered Dose Inhalers work?

MDIs are fast acting drugs. They are used to ease the chest tightness and breathing difficulty commonly associated with sudden, minor asthma attacks. The medicine in Metered Dose Inhalers works on beta receptors that line the walls of the respiratory passages. It stimulates the beta receptors and causes the respiratory passages to expand and reveal asthma symptoms. The way how it works, determine the name of the medicine - it's called a beta-agonist (drug that enhances the activity of beta receptors).

The role of beta blockers in regulating blood pressure

Beta receptors take an important role in the control of blood vessel diameter. They act to narrow the diameter of blood vessels. Beta blockers work to prevent the activation of beta receptors inside the blood vessels and dilating them to lower blood pressure.

Do Asthma medications Affect blood pressure?

It makes sense to wonder about how asthma medications may affect blood pressure in the body because of their beta-agonist activity. Since the asthma medications stimulate beta receptors activity which in turn causes to the blood pressure's elevation, it's reasonable to think that the asthma medications cause to higher blood pressure.

Well the answer is: Yesand no.

Direct exposure of blood vessels to the beta agonist from asthma medication could lead to some blood vessel constriction. However, there are several reasons that this doesn't routinely occur in asthma patients using MDIs:

• MDIs are an inhaled drug and almost all the drug remains within the lungs. It's doesn't gets to the beta receptors in blood vessels


• Albuterol is the beta agonist widely used in MDIs. Although it's not entirely selective, still it's more selective action on a subtype of beta receptor found in larger numbers on respiratory passages than on blood vessels


• The activity of Albuterol has a very short timeframe and if a small amount of drug finds the way to the blood vessels, those small amounts may cause to only a very limited effect on the blood vessels that goes away quickly

The types of medications to treat Asthma

There are also other beta agonists characterized with longer life spans commonly used to treat asthma effects. These drugs include:

1. 
   Fenoterol - This is characterized by intermediate life span and isn't used in the U.S.


2. 
   Salmeterol - is characterized by long life span.

Although these drugs stay inside the body for much longer than the short-action drug Albuterol, still they are inhaled and most of the drug tends to remain in the lungs. These drugs are more selective and they don't tend to work and affect the type of beta receptors that line the walls of the blood vessels.

How natural means can help

The most respective medical journals such as The Lancet, the British Medical Journal, and daily newspapers such as The Sunday Times, The Daily Mail and even on the BBC are consistently reporting how natural means can reverse Hypertension and other common medical conditions.