I've been under medication management for therapy and depression and it turned out that I also have some ADD issues. I've been changing out a few medications with my psychiatrist. The most recent change we made was going from Zoloft (200mg) and Straterra (100mg) to Effexor 150mg for the depression and social anxiety and introduced Aderall XR (20mg) for the ADD.

The reason was because the combination of zoloft and straterra seemed to be raising my resting heart rate to be above 100bpm which long term is not good and I was concerned. So we made the med switch and now my HR is down in the 70bpm range, but now my blood pressure has gone up averaging like 150/70.

Anyone else have similar issues that found a balance working with their MD or Psych to counteract the increased BP and HR side affects?

I have a follow up with him in a few weeks to discuss the progress. I'm thinking an adjustment to the aderall may need to be made at least because later in the evening if I try to relax and read a book or concentrate on something, its very difficult. Not sure if upping the dose is the solution or changing the med.

Any feedback, recommendations to discuss with my doc?

Pretty much all ADD drugs will raise your BP if you take too much. They all work by boosting norepinephrine in your brain. But norepinephrine is a vasoconstrictor (shrinks blood vessels), so it raises blood pressure.

In short, you're going to have to find ways to counter the vasoconstriction of the norepinephrine. And the easiest way to vasodilate is to exercise.

Your diastolic pressure is fine though: is your GP concerned about your systolic pressure?

How long have you been on Adderall? I did the Strattera thing for a long time but had to switch.

It took me a while to get my heartrate to adjust to Adderall (20mg). I can relax in the evenings now and am starting to sleep better but it took me a month to get here.

I have high blood pressure as well, and it took a while to come back down; for me it was about a month. I take Benicar HCT and I measure by bp 2x's per week with my own cuff. My doc told me not to take my bp more than that because it usually starts to rise due to anxiety about the levels. The other thing I do if I notice it's going up is to lower the level of exertion for exercise. For example, switching from running to walking, lighter wt's during wt workouts, etc., but still make sure I exercise, as it helps the bp in the long run.
I hope this helps.

Did you find the strattera helped your ADD? I tried it for 2 months but I didn't notice any difference in symptoms, so I switched back to generic adderall IR.

EssB