Advair: weight gain & appetite?

[Miranda]

The label for Advair has nothing about weight gain and I just did a cursory look at the medical review for it when it was approved and I didn't see anything in there. I would think the systemic levels of the steroid should be lower with the inhalation than with oral, again, just my thinking. There is a reason the Advair label does say to use caution when switching from an oral steroid to Advair. This is because when you are taking the oral steroid, your adrenal gland notes the steroid in your blood and shuts down making more, so then the corticosteroid in your system is from the pill and not from your natural system of making it. You taper off a pill like that to allow your adrenal gland to note less corticosteroid in the system and ramp up production again. If the Advair supplied as much corticosteroid to the blood, then you wouldn't have to worry when switching from oral steroids to Advair. And for you to have increased appetite, the steroid has to be in the blood to get to your brain to stimulate your eating. That's my take on it. I was looking for some comparative pharmacokinetics, but couldn't find any or at least not in the timeframe I had in my schedule.

and the throat changes and hoarseness are in the label as some of the most common side effects of the drug.

Always ask your pharmacist, usually they know the most about these things.

For clarification purposes - Advair does not have albuterol in it. Albuterol is a fast acting beta agonist which quickly dilates the bronchioles. Advair contains salmeterol, a long-acting beta agonist that works over time, not rapidly. This is why the label for Advair tries to alert people to the fact that it is not a 'rescue inhaler', as we often call albuterol. It should not be used in the event of an attack.

The recommendation for Advair also states that if you can be controlled on an inhaler that is just the steroid component, then you should do that. Glad to hear that switching has helped you. I think at my next dr. appt I'm going to look to switching myself, as I think something like Pulmicort would work fine for me and be better for me.

Thx for that info! I wondered what the diff was between the short acting beta agonist, and long acting. I knew that the albuteral was the quick acting drug for rescue, but didn't realize the Advair has this component long term. DD takes Pulmacort via the nebulizer. The doc tried to give me the newest stuff out, Simbacort. Pulmacort PLUS a short acting dialator--made me feel really wigged out. My albuterol does that to me short term, then passes.