Blood Pressure

[JohnM]

problem, with beta blockers and calcium channel things is that they slow your hear rate as well as reducing blood pressure, it seems

Was on atenolol for years, then taken off and put on sotalol for irregular heartbeat.  Made me somewhat lazy and lethargic and could not get heart rate up during exercise. 2 years ago, locum took me off sotalol and apart from terrible withdrawal symptoms, made little difference to irregularity but the lethargy (and very dry skin that had been treated  by 30 UVA B sessions at hospital without success) disappeared. Then just before Christmas was put on 2.5 mg daily bisoprolol bu heart rate went down to around 40, 45 BPM. heart specialist GP changed it to 1.25mg and then after a 24 hour heart monitor session, took me off all together to raise my heart rate.

Beta blockers, though do calm you down.

Use of propranolol

Werbeniuk was ranked as high as 8th in the world in 1983^[ and reached the quarter-finals of the World Snooker Championship four times before propranolol was banned in snooker competition, as it was classified as a performance-enhancing drug by the International Olympic Committee, the anti-doping rules of which were adopted by World Snooker.^[Werbeniuk insisted that his use was medicinal only and under doctor's orders, but was fined and sanctioned anyway.^[He played his last match in 1990.

[timtum]

3 hours ago, ckn said:

 

So, he prescribed Enalapril.  It's an ACE inhibitor like Ramipril (see my comments above about my interactions with it).  His view was that it was so different that I should just accept it and try it.  I decided to suck it up.

 

It has worked for me over the past couple of years.  Down from a high of 220 over 140 (I was plugged into the grid and being used as a surge back up for EDF) to a much more system friendly 125 over 90.  This despite being a career high weight wise.

The sweaty thing you get used to!

 

Good luck.

[Shadow]

28 minutes ago, ckn said:

Y'see, those reactions around concentration and emotional state would be enough for me to be going back and trying to find an alternative, especially the concentration thing.That week out I had in 2013 was bloody scary, I'd simply stopped thinking and genuinely couldn't remember a thing about the week within a day or so of stopping amlopidine.  I'd apparently still been doing things but just seemed a bit confused, it was only when the wife asked me why I was getting ready for work at 11pm that she realised that maybe I was having a bit of a problem.  She thought it was a nervous breakdown at first but my GP told her immediately to stop the new tablet, 24 hours later I was back to normal but tired and 48 hours later I was fine again. 

It's nothing too bad, I've talked it through with the consultant cardiologist and his thoughts were that being told you've got heart failure after being a marathon running, rugby playing ex-soldier and then following that up with a repeat bout of TIA's is enough to put anyone's concentration levels down and emotional state into turmoil and he's not exactly surprised at my current state of things. It's not as if I am unable to work or start crying at the drop of a hat, in fact it's quite strange what does set me off. I had a friend's funeral 2 weeks ago and was fine, I watched Amy & Rory's wedding on a Doctor Who rerun on Netflix and I was sniffling away.

I read back on this forum and had posted one hell of a lot of drivel, I deleted it all.

Open goal and I will refrain from going near it. I am better than that.

[tonyXIII]

8 minutes ago, Shadow said:

 

Open goal and I will refrain from going near it. I am better than that.

I was going to post something, then I realised it would be a bit 'pot and kettle'.

[Shadow]

Just now, tonyXIII said:

I was going to post something, then I realised it would be a bit 'pot and kettle'.

Yes, I did think once I start down that route there's no way I can end up looking good 

[ckn]

47 minutes ago, timtum said:

It has worked for me over the past couple of years.  Down from a high of 220 over 140 (I was plugged into the grid and being used as a surge back up for EDF) to a much more system friendly 125 over 90.  This despite being a career high weight wise.

The sweaty thing you get used to!

 

Good luck.

The sweating thing was annoying but the itch was so bad that it really was unbearable.  Ramipiril had the exact same effect with me and it wouldn't go away over time so I think this one will be a "no thank you" from me.

[ckn]

41 minutes ago, Shadow said:

It's nothing too bad, I've talked it through with the consultant cardiologist and his thoughts were that being told you've got heart failure after being a marathon running, rugby playing ex-soldier and then following that up with a repeat bout of TIA's is enough to put anyone's concentration levels down and emotional state into turmoil and he's not exactly surprised at my current state of things. It's not as if I am unable to work or start crying at the drop of a hat, in fact it's quite strange what does set me off. I had a friend's funeral 2 weeks ago and was fine, I watched Amy & Rory's wedding on a Doctor Who rerun on Netflix and I was sniffling away.

Fair enough, that does explain it and it'd have satisfied me as well.  I'd compromise quite a bit if the magic words "heart failure" came up!

41 minutes ago, Shadow said:

Open goal and I will refrain from going near it. I am better than that.

Oh this was drivel way beyond my normal posts then or now!  The concerning bit was that no-one seemed to pick up on it.  I suppose people are used to weird folk on t'interweb these days

[Bob8]

1 hour ago, Shadow said:

She was indeed an orthopedic surgeon.

[ckn]

1 hour ago, JohnM said:

problem, with beta blockers and calcium channel things is that they slow your hear rate as well as reducing blood pressure, it seems

Was on atenolol for years, then taken off and put on sotalol for irregular heartbeat.  Made me somewhat lazy and lethargic and could not get heart rate up during exercise. 2 years ago, locum took me off sotalol and apart from terrible withdrawal symptoms, made little difference to irregularity but the lethargy (and very dry skin that had been treated  by 30 UVA B sessions at hospital without success) disappeared. Then just before Christmas was put on 2.5 mg daily bisoprolol bu heart rate went down to around 40, 45 BPM. heart specialist GP changed it to 1.25mg and then after a 24 hour heart monitor session, took me off all together to raise my heart rate.

Beta blockers, though do calm you down.

Use of propranolol

Werbeniuk was ranked as high as 8th in the world in 1983^[ and reached the quarter-finals of the World Snooker Championship four times before propranolol was banned in snooker competition, as it was classified as a performance-enhancing drug by the International Olympic Committee, the anti-doping rules of which were adopted by World Snooker.^[Werbeniuk insisted that his use was medicinal only and under doctor's orders, but was fined and sanctioned anyway.^[He played his last match in 1990.

I use atenolol and I tolerate it fantastically well.  Zero side effects that I notice.  I have it in combination with bendroflumethiazide, a diuretic, and again I have no issues with that.  The combination of those two have cut my BP by about 30 points on both systolic and diastolic so I know they work.  If I ever forget on a day then my tinnitus gets to alarm bell ringing levels.  That's why I'm keen to explore whether they're likely to reduce my BP on higher doses or stronger versions, I'm on 100mg/day atenolol and 2.5mg/day bendroflumethiazide.

That's also a side-effect of high blood pressure I could be getting rid of, on days when I'm ultra-relaxed and my BP is nice and low, my tinnitus is non-existent.  It really isn't there and I can hear so much better.

[Shadow]

1 minute ago, ckn said:

Fair enough, that does explain it and it'd have satisfied me as well.  I'd compromise quite a bit if the magic words "heart failure" came up!

I keep telling them to change the name from "hear failure team" to "nothing to worry about team" as calling it Heart Failure seems needlessly melodramatic. 

Oh this was drivel way beyond my normal posts then or now!  The concerning bit was that no-one seemed to pick up on it.  I suppose people are used to weird folk on t'interweb these days 

I've joined a patient's support forum and have so far taken part in 3 discussions, two of which I ended up giving my fairly fortright views on Naturopaths and alternative remedies. If you want to see some strange and needy people...

one was claiming a BP of 275/220 and asking if she should stop taking her pills in favour of some rice based wooo, another was obsessing over his BP beng 140/80 when he wanted to be 110/70 and why wouldn't his cardiologist prescribe him Beta Blockers.

Both got a couple of paragraphs explaining the training process of Consultants in the UK and Attending Physicans in the US and unless you have at least done a bit more than read some stuff on the Internet perhaps it was rude to expect them to go through that training and then decide Moonray Treehugger on newageremedies.com knows better. 

Can't see me lasting on there.

[Shadow]

3 minutes ago, Bob8 said:

She was indeed an orthopedic surgeon.

My brotheris an Orthopaedic consultant, he introduced me to this venn diagram and confirms that all other orthopods except him are sel centred near psychopaths.

[Shadow]

6 minutes ago, ckn said:

I use atenolol and I tolerate it fantastically well.  Zero side effects that I notice.  I have it in combination with bendroflumethiazide, a diuretic, and again I have no issues with that.  The combination of those two have cut my BP by about 30 points on both systolic and diastolic so I know they work.  If I ever forget on a day then my tinnitus gets to alarm bell ringing levels.  That's why I'm keen to explore whether they're likely to reduce my BP on higher doses or stronger versions, I'm on 100mg/day atenolol and 2.5mg/day bendroflumethiazide.

That's also a side-effect of high blood pressure I could be getting rid of, on days when I'm ultra-relaxed and my BP is nice and low, my tinnitus is non-existent.  It really isn't there and I can hear so much better.

Joking apart, is the Tinnitus Artillery related? I have partial hearing loss that is in the same range as 7.62 sounds.

edit apparently entrely coincidental when I approached the Army about it.

[ckn]

1 hour ago, Bob8 said:

I went out with a sugeon once.  Nice lass.

But, even with me have fifteen years of experience and a PhD, she assumed she could pretty much walk in and do my job tomorrow if it was required.

If you ever want to have fun with an English hospital consultant, ask them why CCG Clinical Directors are all GPs and in charge of hospital money allocations.  See if they've many teeth left after grinding them into stumps.

It's even easier if you tell them a pharmacist you talked to said they didn't agree with their medication plan.

The easiest one of all is to suggest to a consultant-grade surgeon that they're not as good a doctor as A&E ones because they wouldn't be allowed to do an emergency shift in A&E that a ST1 doctor could easily cover.

[ckn]

2 minutes ago, Shadow said:

Joking apart, is the Tinnitus Artillery related? I have partial hearing loss that is in the same range as 7.62 sounds.

edit apparently entrely coincidental when I approached the Army about it.

Busy thread this one!  Bit of both really. 

I have hearing loss that's 100% definitely artillery as it's my left ear that's the worst, that's the ear that I shifted the ear defender off so I could hear what people were saying.  The right ear is also damaged but not quite as bad.  Part of it was the arrogance of youth, my job was at the pointy end of the artillery where the shells landed and I only thought the gun bunnies had to deal with the shot noise while I ignored the bang of the end explosion.  I was also on the rifle range at least once every two weeks, even if only the 25m range with .22 and pistols and my ear defenders were rarely used properly on both ears, again the arrogance of youth.  I fried the noise-cancelling active ones a week after being issued them by dropping them so went back standard issue ones that were just slightly better than fingers in the ear.

The tinnitus is 100% blood pressure.  When my BP is low, it's not there, when it's high it's a really high pitched fire alarm.  It is an effective warning sign of me getting very stressed or having forgotten my tablets in a day.

As an aside, a good friend is a Canadian ex-Navy type, he has bad hearing clearly linked to his service.  When he left, he had an exit questionnaire that was yes/no tick boxes including "were you subject to very loud noises without proper ear protection?"  Yes.  "Did you carry heavy weights above 30kg (or similar) either on your back or in your arms?"  Yes.  And so on.  They gave him a card that he showed me that gave him coverage for all future conditions that come from that.

His hearing is like mine, a loud pub and I struggle to hear individual conversations, those situations are utterly useless for all bar the most expensive hearing aids.  The Canadian veterans affairs lot bought him the top-of-the-range £5000 ones that can be channelled and focussed on individual people, they also paid for people to do his garden, clean his windows and so on while he got used to them as they could be disorienting and he was recommended not to do that sort of thing.  I thought he was taking the proverbial until he showed me a copy of his letter authorising it.

[Spidey]

3 hours ago, JohnM said:

problem, with beta blockers and calcium channel things is that they slow your hear rate as well as reducing blood pressure, it seems

Was on atenolol for years, then taken off and put on sotalol for irregular heartbeat.  Made me somewhat lazy and lethargic and could not get heart rate up during exercise. 2 years ago, locum took me off sotalol and apart from terrible withdrawal symptoms, made little difference to irregularity but the lethargy (and very dry skin that had been treated  by 30 UVA B sessions at hospital without success) disappeared. Then just before Christmas was put on 2.5 mg daily bisoprolol bu heart rate went down to around 40, 45 BPM. heart specialist GP changed it to 1.25mg and then after a 24 hour heart monitor session, took me off all together to raise my heart rate.

Beta blockers, though do calm you down.

Use of propranolol

Werbeniuk was ranked as high as 8th in the world in 1983^[ and reached the quarter-finals of the World Snooker Championship four times before propranolol was banned in snooker competition, as it was classified as a performance-enhancing drug by the International Olympic Committee, the anti-doping rules of which were adopted by World Snooker.^[Werbeniuk insisted that his use was medicinal only and under doctor's orders, but was fined and sanctioned anyway.^[He played his last match in 1990.

I think my heart rate was a little on the high side so bisoprolol was ideal for me. It levels off at 70 now. I used to be on 10mg at the start. But easily manage now at 2.5mg

[graveyard johnny]

dont talk to my mates sister about doctors at the min- couple of weeks ago her husband was sent home by the gp wrongly diagnosed, few days later  collapsed went to hospital sent home again by the hospital wrongly diagnosed , collapsed at work again a few days later in the morning, taken to hospital, dead in the evening

[Red Willow]

Also take Atenolol and Bendroflumethiazide and have done for about 15 years. They keep my blood pressure under control. The only problem I have is the doctor making me go to an appointment to give me the results of my annual blood test. I go they say everything is great, carry on. They could do that over the phone.

My son was given propranolol to treat migraine as a child, he went into a hypoglycaemic fit and ha to be rushed to hospital.

 

[graveyard johnny]

avoid doctors at all costs, frontmen for legalised drug dealers, charlatans the whole lot, "heres some chemical formula to cure your ills sir, may (almost certainly will) lead to worse side effects, signing prescriptions like death warrants in the 3rd reich - once they get their hands on you then your just another cash cow for pharmaceutical giants and their shareholders, every one I know that has died ended up with stacks of useless drugs on the bedside tables, what good did they do? none.

[JohnM]

20 minutes ago, graveyard johnny said:

avoid doctors at all costs, frontmen for legalised drug dealers, charlatans the whole lot, "heres some chemical formula to cure your ills sir, may (almost certainly will) lead to worse side effects, signing prescriptions like death warrants in the 3rd reich - once they get their hands on you then your just another cash cow for pharmaceutical giants and their shareholders, every one I know that has died ended up with stacks of useless drugs on the bedside tables, what good did they do? none.

Whatever it is that has caused you to write this, i think you'll find there is a drug for it. ?

[Billypop]

41 minutes ago, graveyard johnny said:

avoid doctors at all costs, frontmen for legalised drug dealers, charlatans the whole lot, "heres some chemical formula to cure your ills sir, may (almost certainly will) lead to worse side effects, signing prescriptions like death warrants in the 3rd reich - once they get their hands on you then your just another cash cow for pharmaceutical giants and their shareholders, every one I know that has died ended up with stacks of useless drugs on the bedside tables, what good did they do? none.

Some people may think you are nutty, sadly you may be quite right.

[Billypop]

I was misdiagnosed so many times, it's scary

[graveyard johnny]

35 minutes ago, Billypop said:

Some people may think you are nutty, sadly you may be quite right.

cant you be nutty AND right ?

[Billypop]

1 hour ago, graveyard johnny said:

cant you be nutty AND right ?

Yes.

[ckn]

2 hours ago, graveyard johnny said:

avoid doctors at all costs, frontmen for legalised drug dealers, charlatans the whole lot, "heres some chemical formula to cure your ills sir, may (almost certainly will) lead to worse side effects, signing prescriptions like death warrants in the 3rd reich - once they get their hands on you then your just another cash cow for pharmaceutical giants and their shareholders, every one I know that has died ended up with stacks of useless drugs on the bedside tables, what good did they do? none.

A doctor of any type in the UK who gives a drug prescription based on a financial incentive rather than clinical need will be struck off and have zero defence.

All you need to look at is the increase in life expectancy to know what modern medicine will do for people.  The fact that they die with piles of medication shows that they have needed it and would probably have died years before without it.

When I was growing up in the 1970s and 1980s, someone in their 60s was OLD, these days it's uncommon for 60-ish year olds to be having geriatric diseases.

When my wife had to go into hospital in 2016 with sepsis and double pneumonia, she survived purely because of modern medicine.  Even the drugs and technology of 10 years ago would not have been enough to save her beyond blind luck.

Look at stent technology for repairing heart problems, in, done, out in two days when just over 20 years ago it was routinely a proper surgical operation with all the risks that come from cracking the ribcage and getting into the heart proper.

You may have a case for your comment in somewhere like the US, but the UK is wildly different.

[Bob8]

1 hour ago, Saint 1 said:

I realise this might sound a bit hippy but have you considered trying something like meditation or yoga? If you can't reduce the number of stressful things in your life, you can at least try changing how many stress-relieving things you do. I've taken yoga up recently and feel noticably more relaxed afterwards, even lasting into the next day. Why Zebras Don't Get Ulcers is a brilliant book on stress too which I recommend to anyone remotely interested in the topic. 

To avoid the feeling of hippiness, it can be checked out in the scientific literature.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/

It is effective.

What I had assumed was the pain and stiffness of getting older was actually chronic back pain, and I ended up an inch taller.