OT Blood pressure

[philo]

Glad that's working I am very much looking forward to my appt. next week

[philo]

I totally agree but I had to admit to myself that I now have a problem that requires a doctor's attention.

Were it up to my wife, she'd want to pay more attention to my "bad joke" syndrome.

[philo]

Thanks.

[Bud]

Most doctors today love to prescribe blood pressure and cholesterol lowering pills because they get kickbacks from the pharmaceutical companies....but they may not do you any good.

Check out the health website of a former/retired NASA astronaut and physician.

If you are actually concerned about your health (most people just want to eat junk food and take pills), start here:

[philo]

Yep and I am not going to take the cholesterol stuff. They say that it may lower your numbers but it will not increase your life expectancy.

That said I have to do something about my blood pressure. Other than the chips...my wife and I do not have much junk food though.

thanks

[Taxed and Spent]

cholesterol is also way over hyped. do your research.

[philo]

Yep. I told my previous doctor many times to forget about it.

[Frank]

I tell folks that now that I am old nothing works as well and I can't do as much as I did when younger but I still have the same appetite for food and drink.

[ChairMan]

Red yeast Rice contains lovanstatin which is in a lot of medicines for BP, or at least thats what my doc said

[My 2 Cents]

Age 68 and I've had high blood pressure for years now, I guess I've got stage 3 kidney disease, from what the last lab test indicated. The doc never called so I guess it's not important yet. Stable angina and carry the little nitroglycerin pills and they work just fine. No stents if I can avoid that. The blood pressure problem seems to be easily controlled with a couple of meds. I use the Walmart pharmacy the 4 bucks a month thing but last time it was like 12 dollars for three months worth of both scripts. Insurance paid part of the cost. That damn tenuous shot, I got hung on that ... had to pay the whole thing out of pocket. Everyone says ... but it's preventive... yeah prevents the doctor's wife from having to drive a year old car. What else? I ride a bicycle about 30 miles a week and my dog and I walk a mile most every day. When the angina hit I dieted and Lost weight and now I get around better than I did 5 years now. 29 grams of fiber/day, so said the "up urs" doc... that's a lot fiber! Well it is for us Americans. Glucosamine for the knees, a baby aspirin a day. Whole grain stuff, oatmeal, bran flakes, veggies, sawdust whatever it takes. Thus far blood sugar hasn't been a problem, and still a full head of hair. I made it 10 years longer than my dad did, that was one of the things on my bucket list. If there is an after life I'll rub it in when or if I see him again.

[Ed Pawlowski]

Tried statins and won't touch them again. I eat 10 to 12 pistachios at lunch every day and that helped bring it down. I still eat butter and eggs too.

[Ed Pawlowski]

It is called a "wellness" exam. Covered once a year

We have the AARP/United Healthcare supplement. My wife has had three hospital visits this year. One was $202,000 list price. so far, my out of pocket expenses for everything is $0.

[Phil Kangas]

Cut down on your sugar intake. I use splenda instead as it is made from regular sugar but is ignored by the body. And cut back on white bread too.

[micky]

I agree. there must be truth to it for some people, but I eat a whole box of salt every year just from what I add on my own, not counting what's in the food and my BP is normal all the time, even though I'm fat, out of shape, and 69. It used to be 40 points low with the same salt intake.

Also wrt losing weight. Yes, if you don't have salt in your system you won't have as much water, but one salty meal and you're back where you were. If you'd eaten salt all that time, it would be excreted and you'd be no worse off. I think.

The doctor did prescribe a statin last winter, so I take that, and vitamin D. (He says no one gets enough vitamin D otherwise, but he said no need when I asked about multivitamins. He's 68 himself. I'll be sorry to see him retire some day.)

[(PeteCresswell)]

Per philo:

The John Hancock Life Insurance "Life Expectancy Calculator" at

tells me that dropping from 215 to 200 15 pounds will add 2 years to my life expectancy. 6'4" tall.

Dropping more does not seem to change the numbers.

It is informative to play around with the "Exercise" numbers.

"Regular Exercise" (whatever that is....) vs "I am not active" is good for six years.

[(PeteCresswell)]

Per notbob:

+1 on that.

After winding up on the grass from a major episode of atrial fibrillation I went to see the first guy.

Hardly made eye contact - just kept his head down typing away on his laptop. 3 visits later, he could tell me almost word-for-word what went down during any of the previous visits. But he was unresponsive to the things I said.... I got the impression that I was just another old guy who was going to die in a few years and he was basically working from a cookbook.

He rolled a couple of pills and basically called it a wrap.

One of the pills was a beta blocker and it sent my quality of life right down the toilet. Told him that.... no particular response.

Said to myself "The hell with this guy"... and went shopping.

Next guy, I could *talk* with... and when I said something stupid, he would interrupt me and tell me why it was stupid...

And one of the things he told me was that the beta blocker was strictly for the patient's comfort: it reduces the frequency of a-fib episodes.... but, since mine were rare - albeit severe - there was not much reason to take the beta blocker - especially since it was ruining my life.

The one that keeps you alive is the anti-coagulant (afib episodes tend to form clots in the blood as it passes through the heart).... and the incidence of death with or without a beta blocker is the same given that one is taking the anti-coagulant.

I came away feeling *much* better.... OTOH, maybe this guy is all personality, and is BS-ing me.... but I don't think so because I double checked his story with a couple other docs - albeit not cardio buys.

Bottom Line: Shop around!!!! There really are night-and-day differences between docs with the same training.

[(PeteCresswell)]

Per philo:

My understanding is that it's more the ratio of HDL to LDL than the actual overall level of cholesterol.

[rbowman]

Lisinopril.

One tablet a day keeps me down in the 120 range. It runs about $12 for a

90 day supply and I haven't seen any of the potential side effects.

There are three major families and lisinopril is an ACE inhibitor. Some people wind up taking a mixture if one doesn't work. Each has their drawbacks. For example, calcium channel blockers lower your heart rate. Since my resting heart rate is around 55 my doctor ruled that out. Some can be expensive and require close monitoring. Fortunately the patent on lisinopril ran out in 2002 iirc so there are many generic sources.

[rbowman]

I've noticed exercise drops my BP somewhat. By that I don't mean taking the poodle for a walk around the block but rather something that keeps my heart rate up to about 90% for and hour or two. I can't do that walking on level ground but fortunately we have an abundant supply of mountains. 2000' of ascent gets the heart moving.

[rbowman]

My doctor took the time to explain the several options, their potential side effects, and the costs before telling me what she recommended trying first. Lisinopril worked and it's cheap.