On today's episode of real-life pharmacology, I'm going to cover alpha blockers.

The most common alpha blockers I see used in clinical practice are doxazosin,

Cardura, Terrescicin, Hytron is brand name, Prazacin, which is MiniPress by brand name,

and Tamselocin, which is Flomax by brand name.

So with Flomax or Tamselosin, I do want to mention that this is a little more selective for bladder

tissue. So that can be good or bad, depending upon what we're trying to do. The two

primary uses for alpha blockers are BPH. It kind of helps relax the smooth muscle and it eases the

flow of urine out through the body and passing urine that way.

And it does this by blocking alpha receptors.

Alpha receptors, by blocking them, we cause a relaxation in that smooth muscle.

And that works exactly the same way on blood vessels as well. So I did mention selectivity.

So tamselosin flomax, you will not see used for management of hypertension. Now the others are more

non-selective, doxazosin, terasicin, prazacin, those are non-selective

and those can be used to help lower blood pressure.

With that said, for the blood pressure lowering effects of those three agents I mentioned,

the medications themselves tend to really cause some significant orthostasis

or a drop in blood pressure upon position changes,

and it can almost lead to syncope type effects

where patients feel like they're basically passing out.

So these agents are definitely not a first-line agent in the management of blood pressure,

and that's really the primary reason that they aren't a first-line agent.

Now, if you've got a patient with dual diagnoses of hypertension,

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