Are you taking blood pressure tablets unnecessarily?

See this recent article commenting on a BMJ article about the ineffectiveness of blood pressure tablets.

Here is a quote from Professor Jerome Hoffman of UCLA and an expert in critical appraisal of medical literature, from the BMJ piece:

"We’ve long known that almost all benefit from treating severe hypertension comes with lowering BP [blood pressure] just a little. On the other hand, efforts to lower BP to ‘normal,’ typically requiring multiple drugs, are not only usually unsuccessful but produce more harm than good, since adverse effects of intensive treatment outweigh the minimal marginal benefit of a little more BP ‘control.’ Drug treatment of mild hypertension….may be of great value to drug makers, but it was almost predictable that it would provide little or no benefit for patients."

And another quote:

"David Cundiff, one of the authors of the Cochrane review has said that he “believes that the analysis should lead to dramatic changes in the way doctors treat mild hypertension, allowing patients to throw away their blood pressure pills and focus instead on far more effective as well as evidence based approaches…"

On Inside Health on Radio 4 on 21st August they too were discussing the over-diagnosis and over-treatment of high blood pressure:

 

"Dr Mark Porter asks whether doctors can try too hard in the early detection of disease and investigates the overdiagnosis of hypertension. This week he discovers that as many as 3 million people who have been told they have high blood pressure may not actually have it - could you be one of them?"

 

The programme found that there is indeed a large and growing problem of overdiagnosis and over-treatment for blood pressure. The general opinion was that it is usually better to avoid prescribing the blood pressure drugs, which of course have adverse side-effects, and instead advise patients about life-style changes that reduce high blood pressure. My own very high blood pressure years ago was dramatically and safely lowered by seriously reducing my intake of salt and salty food.

On Inside Health on Radio 4 this week: some people are being misdiagnosed as having exercise-induced asthma

On Inside Health this week: some people are being misdiagnosed as having exercise-induced asthma. So if you or someone you know has had this diagnosis, and especially if you are an athlete, more especially if medication has been prescribed, and even more especially if that is steroid medication, then I suggest you visit this BBC webpage. Rather than exercise-induced asthma, the problem may be vocal cord dysfunction, and this problem does not respond to inhalers. I suggest you also have a look at my recent blogpost about asthma.

On Radio 4's Inside Health programme today one of the topics discussed was Tinnitus

On Radio 4's Inside Health programme today one of the topics discussed was Tinnitus. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think that cutting salt intake was mentioned as helpful with this problem. Nonetheless if you type something like "tinnitus salt reduction" into your favourite search engine you will see that many people find that sodium reduction reduces the intensity of their tinnitus. I believe this is because there is a connection between tinnitus and fluid retention. - Anyway, since we are constantly advised these days to eat less salt to reduce heart disease and the risk of high blood pressure, heart attack and stroke, and it is manifestly good for health to reduce salt intake, why not take the plunge and seriously cut down on salt and salty food? This is a safe, cost-free and drug-free course of action. It may very well improve your tinnitus problem as well as benefiting your general health and longevity. - What's not to like?