Mayo Clinic Health Manager
Get free personalized health guidance for you and your family.
Get Started
About our e-newsletters
- Free e-newsletters
- Mayo Clinic expertise
- We do not share your e-mail address
Housecall, our weekly general-interest e-newsletter, keeps you up to date on a wide variety of health topics with timely, reliable, practical information, recipes, blogs, questions and answers with Mayo Clinic experts and more. Our biweekly topic-specific e-newsletters also include blogs, questions and answers with Mayo Clinic experts, and other useful information that will help you manage your health.
Housecall Archives
Mayo Clinic Housecall
Stay up to date on the latest health information.
What you get
- Free weekly e-newsletter
- Mayo Clinic expertise
- Recipes, tools and other helpful information
- We do not share your e-mail address
Side Effects
Along with its needed effects, a medicine may cause some unwanted effects. Although not all of these side effects may occur, if they do occur they may need medical attention.
Check with your doctor immediately if any of the following side effects occur:
Rare- Chest pain
- Decreased ability to exercise
- Fainting
- Swelling of feet or lower legs
- Trouble in breathing
Check with your doctor as soon as possible if any of the following side effects occur:
More common- Increased blood pressure
- Difficult or painful urination
- Fast or irregular heartbeat
- Feeling that others can hear your thoughts
- Feeling that others are watching you or controlling your behavior
- Hallucinations (feeling, seeing, or hearing things that are not there)
- Headache (severe)
- Mental depression
- Numbness, especially on one side of the face or body
- Skin rash or hives
- Sore throat and fever (with diethylpropion)
- Talking, feeling, and acting with excitement and activity you cannot control
- Unusual bleeding or bruising (with diethylpropion)
- Abdominal or stomach cramps
- Coma
- Confusion
- Convulsions (seizures)
- Diarrhea (severe)
- Dizziness, lightheadedness, or fainting
- Fast breathing
- Feeling of panic
- Fever
- Hallucinations (seeing, hearing or feeling things that are not there)
- High or low blood pressure
- Hostility with urge to attack
- Irregular heartbeat
- Nausea or vomiting (severe)
- Overactive reflexes
- Restlessness
- Trembling or shaking
- Tiredness, weakness, and mental depression following effects of excitement
Abuse of a sympathomimetic appetite suppressant (taking the medicine in larger doses or taking it more frequently or for a longer time than the doctor ordered) can cause the following side effects:
- Changes in personality
- Excessive, excited activity
- Irritability (severe)
- Mental illness (severe), similar to schizophrenia
- Skin disease
- Trouble in sleeping (severe)
Some side effects may occur that usually do not need medical attention. These side effects may go away during treatment as your body adjusts to the medicine. Also, your health care professional may be able to tell you about ways to prevent or reduce some of these side effects. Check with your health care professional if any of the following side effects continue or are bothersome or if you have any questions about them:
More common- Constipation
- Dizziness or lightheadedness
- Dryness of mouth
- False sense of well-being
- Headache
- Irritability
- Nausea or vomiting
- Nervousness or restlessness
- Stomach cramps or pain
- Trembling or shaking
- Trouble in sleeping
After the stimulant effects have worn off, drowsiness, unusual tiredness or weakness, or mental depression may occur.
Less common or rare- Blurred vision
- Changes in sexual desire or decreased sexual ability
- Diarrhea
- Drowsiness
- Frequent urge to urinate or increased urination
- Increased sweating
- Unpleasant taste
Although not all of the side effects listed above have been reported for all of these medicines, they have been reported for at least one of them. However, since all of the sympathomimetic appetite suppressants are similar, any of the above side effects may occur with any of these medicines.
After you stop using this medicine, your body may need time to adjust. The length of time this takes depends on the amount of medicine you were using and how long you used it. During this time check with your doctor if you notice any of the following side effects:
- Extreme tiredness or weakness
- Mental depression
- Nausea or vomiting
- Stomach cramps or pain
- Trembling
- Trouble in sleeping or nightmares
Other side effects not listed may also occur in some patients. If you notice any other effects, check with your healthcare professional.
Call your doctor for medical advice about side effects. You may report side effects to the FDA at 1-800-FDA-1088.
