Coronavirus and AF medicines could interact

[MarkS]

There has been quite a bit of publicity about potential CV meds. The most promising is an anti-malarial drug, hydroxychloroquinone (chloroquine), particularly in combination with azithromycin (an antibiotic).

However these drugs have a risk of Torsades de Pointes (TdP). Each of these drugs alone can cause QTc prolongation.

They are considered to be particularly dangerous if a patient is taking another drug that can prolong the QT interval. These include the common AF drugs, flecainide and sotalol.

The research is here (though you may need to log in):

practiceupdate.com/content/...

You can check any drugs you're taking for AF here:

crediblemeds.org/index.php/...

Flecainide, sotalol and amiodarone all come out red. Warfarin, diltiazem and dabigatran look OK.

If it all goes haywire, as it may well do, and you are unfortunate enough to get taken in, the doctor treating you will not be a specialist and is unlikely to know of these interactions.

[doodle68]

Thank you Mark for your informative post....

[Hidden]

Many thanks for that Mark, very useful, looks like a research afternoon coming up 😂😂

John

[Finvola]

Thank you Mark - a very good early warning to be careful.

[jeanjeannie50]

Thank you for making us aware of this.

[Bagrat]

Thanks for that.

[BobD Volunteer]

As always Mark thank you.

[baba]

Thank you. I’ve not had time to read your links yet.

CV on this forum usually means “cardioversion”. It is now increasingly being used for Coronavirus. We need to make a distinction when posting. As you did on your heading .

[lovetogarden]

So glad to see this posted here already!

I took hydroxychloroquine (plaquenil) for 14 years for rheumatoid arthritis. When I started sotalol last year, even my cardiologist didn’t flag the potential problems. As usual, I did some digging, found the info myself. (I think the cardiologist was a bit impressed!) Rheumatologist agreed and I’m off that med.

I do hope this med is found to help treat Covid, but we all need to be aware of the risks if we end up needing it. A short fact sheet to go w the posts MarkS provided:

healthline.com/health/hydro...

Stay home, stay well!!