Loading...
Aerobic exercise has been promoted as one of several nondrug therapies for hypertension. Because many hypertensive patients take beta blockers, and because these drugs are thought to attenuate the response to exercise, Ades and colleagues studied the interactions between beta blockers and exercise. They compared the effects of propranolol, a nonselective beta blocker, metoprolol, a selective beta blocker, and placebo in 30 mildly hypertensive persons enrolled in a ten-week aerobic conditioning program.
Prior to the program, propranolol inhibited patients' exercise capacity on treadmill testing, while placebo and metoprolol did not affect performance. After the ten-week program, fitness was most improved in placebo-treated patients and least …