clonidine
Catapres-TTS
clonidine
hydrochloride
Catapres, Dixarit (CAN), Duraclon
Nursing Considerations
• Use clonidine cautiously in elderly
patients, who may be more sensitive to its
hypotensive effect.
•Monitor blood pressure and heart rate
often during clonidine therapy.
• Expect transdermal clonidine to take 2 to
3 days to lower blood pressure.
• Remove patch before patient has an MRI
to avoid possible burns at the patch site.
• Be aware that stopping drug abruptly can
elevate serum catecholamine levels and
cause such withdrawal symptoms as nervousness,
agitation, headache, confusion,
tremor, and rebound hypertension.
• Expect hypertension to return within
48 hours after drug is discontinued.
PATIENT TEACHING
• Advise patient to take drug exactly as prescribed
and not to stop abruptly because
withdrawal symptoms and severe hypertension
may occur.
• Instruct patient to consult prescriber if
dry mouth or drowsiness becomes a problem
during oral clonidine therapy. To
minimize these effects, prescriber may
suggest taking most of dosage at bedtime.
• If a transdermal patch loosens during 7-
day application period, tell patient to place
adhesive overlay directly over patch to
ensure adhesion.
• Tell patient to rotate transdermal sites.
• Instruct patient to remove patch and place
a fresh one on another site if skin irritation,
redness, or rash develops at patch
site.
• Advise patient to fold used transdermal
patch in half with adhesive sides together
and discard it out of the reach of children.
• Because of possible sedation, advise
patient to avoid hazardous activities until
drug’s CNS effects are known.
• Advise men that libido may decrease.
• Instruct patient to report chest pain, dizziness
with position changes, excessive
drowsiness, rash, urine retention, and
vision changes. As needed, tell patient to
rise slowly to avoid hypotensive effects.
• Inform patient who wears contact lenses
that clonidine may cause dry eyes.
