I have a prescription for propranolol that comes with a precautionary statement to, “Take with food or milk.” I know I’ve seen that on other prescriptions over the years.
I’d always assumed the purpose was to avoid an upset stomach. But I don’t know that. That seems to be what my friends think as well. I’ve had to take it a few times with nothing else and have not noted unpleasant tummy symptoms. And today I did that again and noticed that it was not as effective as is usually the case.
So, does the take with food admonishment have anything to do with how well your bod gets the drug delivered?
Caveats possibly related to it not seeming to be as effective today:
I have a few of these 'scrips stashed around (office, car, etc.) and I’m not sure of the age of the pill I took today
I got seriously 'faced at last night’s HouDope gathering
AFAIK, taking propanolol with food is not necessary.
Generally, taking a drug with food or milk is advised if the drug might promote heartburn or dyspepsia (indigestion). Common examples of this sort of drug include most NSAID’s (eg. ASA, Motrin, etc.) and prednisone. To my knowledge, propanolol doesn’t fall into this category.
Sometimes, when a drug can lead to nausea, it is recommended that it be taken with food, eg. codeine and other narcotics (this doesn’t make a huge amount of sense, IMO).
Although I am not a pharmacist, I can’t think of a reason why a drug must be taken with food (but I’d love to know if there is).
In some cases, a drug must be taken on an empty stomach lest the presence of food interfere with its absorption. Examples of this type of drug include Fosamax (alendronate), Didronel (etidronate), tetracycline, and many others.
Sometimes a drug must be taken by itself, and not near the same time as other drugs. This is an issue when the drug binds to (and thereby renders unavailable) other drugs. A classic example of a drug of this nature is Questran (cholestyramine). Other drugs must be taken one hour before Questran or three hours after - otherwise they’d be bound up and their absorption prevented.
Beatle, call you local drug store and ask for the pharmacist, they LOVE to answer questions like this, and are good at it!
I got the order from my doc not to take aspirin anymore. I whined a little and he said that it isn’t what the aspirin does right then and there to your stomach but what it does after it goes in the blood stream and to the stomach. I’m thinking that over and plan to chat with my pharmacist about that next time I see him/her. But I have asked questions like this over the phone and have always gotten good responses.
Spend enough time lurking and a question WILL come your way!
Actually there are some drugs–(i.e. nitrofurantoin (an antibiotic used mostly for urinary infections)) that are not absorbed properly unless there is food in the stomach.
Gastric emptying time can also be a factor–food keeps the drug around for a longer period, and conseqently more is absorbed.
to get to the OP, if the propranolol doesn’t upset your tummy, take it with or without food. I’m reasonably sure that it doesn’t matter. On one site I just looked at, it even recommended taking 1 hr before eating, which translates to on an empty stomach.
What can sometimes happen is that the auxiliary labels (the extra instructions on the little colored stickers) that get affixed to the bottle are coded in specifically for a drug, and there can be errors in programming that link strange directions to a particular drug. I have had this happen several times.
The other thing that happens is sometimes technicians (and even pharmacists, I hate to admit) get into auto-pilot mode and just put all of the stickers on the bottle. I try to catch all of the cautions for males to not take if they are pregnant or breast-feeding, infants to not operate heavy machinery, etc.
And might I add, welcome aboard LisaRx. We now count you amongst our mighty arsenal.
OK, so I recognize what you’ve noted about the bioavailability of one drug being affected by the presence of food in the system; can you tell me if this is relevant to the application of propranolol?
“Propranolol is rapidly and completely absorbed from the GI tract…”. This tells me that your body is going to use it whether or not you take it on an empty stomach.
I won’t hijack this too much. If you don’t get a good response, let me know. One of my professors is an expert on aspirin and how it works. I could probably give an hour long lecture on aspirin off the top of my head.
Hey Jois (good to see you back again - you dropped out for a bit), I took your advice.
Between LisaRx’ contributions and that received from my local pharmacist, I’ve learned that adsorption of propranolol is not affected by the presence of a food bolus; the advice to take it with something of substance is meant to avoid the bad tummy.
I’ve never experienced the bad tummy from it, and I’ll note the prescription bottle also carries a warning against operating heavy equipment. I don’t know how much of this stuff you have to take to get a buzz, but I’ll never get there.
and he said that it isn’t what the aspirin does right then and there to your stomach but what it does after it goes in the blood stream and to the stomach. I’m thinking that over and plan to chat with my pharmacist about that next time I see him/her. But I have asked questions like this over the phone and have always gotten good responses.