My blood pressure is also caffeine sensitive. My doctor told me I should be able to drink 2 cups of coffee/day, but when I did that my BP stayed elevated for several hours. I now have one cup of green tea in the morning, and only have caffeine-free beverages the rest of the day.
@DrGoogle, most teas have significant amounts of caffeine but less than most coffees.
Gotta be careful with some of the blood pressure medicines. My dad started taking lisinopril and he started getting wobbly legged and dizzy sometimes after standing from crouched position…especially after exerting himself in hot, humid outdoor weather. He was mowing lawn in hot full Florida sun a couple of weeks ago, stopped to bend over fooling around adjusting mower, stood up and was talking to neighbor when my dad suddenly got lightheaded and actually fainted in front yard. Adding over exertion in hot heat with blood pressure medicine can be bad.
I’ll worry about that right after this. http://healthimpactnews.com/2013/salt-reduction-recommendations-wrong-cdc-study/
So give this “news” a decade to be tested and replicated.
I would like to know how effective these lifestyle changes (link) are for mild HTN and how many doctors recommend them/ how many people try them prior to starting medication. .
http://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/high-blood-pressure/in-depth/high-blood-pressure/art-20046974
I don’t know a lot about salt but there may be subgroups who have salt sensitive high blood pressure.
My blood pressure tends to be around 90/60. It doesn’t feel good to have a bp that is hard to find. I’ve heard that in older people (maybe 80s and older?) a higher blood pressure appears to be associated with lower incidence of Alzheimer’s disease.
Fang, appreciate the info. I didn’t meant to imply these were seriously ill people because the measure is of 10 year future risk.
IMHO, the 15% level for the Framingham 10 year estimate is fairly high since “nearly 30% of coronary heart disease (CHD) events in both men and women were singularly attributable to blood pressure levels that exceeded high normal (≥130/85).” And if you go through the Framingham points system, you need a lot of fairly bad scores to reach the 21-22 points necessary for that level. Take a 60 year old: both sexes get 10 pts for that age; women get 4 pts for cholesterol over 280 and men get 3; women get 2 pts for smoking and men get 1; both sexes get 2 pts for HDL under 40; and then comes bp, with women getting 5 pts if treated systolic is over 140 while men get 2 (and add a pt if over 160 for both sexes). That shows the risk is highly loaded in the systolic levels and even then you need high cholesterol on top to get to the 22 points. When they say high risk level, even at over 75, as a male you’re only at 13 pts - though as a woman you’re at 16 - so a male still isn’t at 20% high risk without high bp or really low HDL.
My guess is that people with relatively low risk will be put on higher dosages than they get now and that more people will be pushed on to drugs and we’ll find that the cost of this is out of whack for the changes in risk. But yeah, this is really interesting for people with high cholesterol (and low HDL in particular), and for women as they age.
@rosered55, too low or too high blood pressure is bad for Alzheimer’s disease. My husband has very unusual low heart rate. I don’t know if it’s good or bad, i just don’t know what it is yet. No wonder he is always very calm.
Is he an athlete? Athletes with high physical fitness often have very low resting heart rates. Miguel Indurain Larraya, a 5-time Tour de France champion, had a resting heart rate of 28 beats per minute.
Lergnom, do you have stats on how many people 50 or over with high blood pressure would also have 10 year Framingham scores over 15%? Is it 10%, 50%, 80%? I’m curious because if, say, 80% of over 50s with high blood pressure also have high Framingham scores, then we need to be less concerned about those few who have high blood pressure but good scores. But if most over 50s with high blood pressure don’t have high scores, then we should be worried about whether we are overtreating those people.
According to Wikipedia, virtually all Americans over 70 have Framingham scores over 20%.
UCB, he is a runner. I think his heart rate is less than 60. People in doctors office always wonder if it’s normal for him and he has to say he runs. Good to know that somebody has lower resting heart rate but is that for a younger guy. My husband is near retirement age. Does it depend on age?
Resting heart rate goes up with age. Mine used to be in the mid 40s, but now it’s in the mid 50s. A low heart rate is thought to be good.
I have concerns about the wonders of modern medicine and extended life spans. My 89-year-old father-in-law takes at least four or five medications. He has diabetes, heart disease, kidney disease, and arthritis and has had to use external “plumbing” since having his bladder removed because of bladder cancer 14 years ago. He is obese. He’s now self-confined to a wheelchair because walking is so painful. My mother-in-law, his wife of 67 years, is also 89. She takes no medications except something on occasion to quell anxiety related to her late-stage (but could last for many more years) Alzheimer’s disease.
@DrGoogle Black tea has more caffeine than green tea, about twice as much.
Low heart rate is associated with strong hearts that can pump more blood per beat. Obviously, exercise can cause one’s heart to get stronger, like with other muscles.
Just took mine with the cuff DH’s doc recommended. 116/60. Of course that’s a glass of wine and a dip in the pool after teaching 6th graders all day!
This easy to say and doesn’t help people with serious hypertension, but learning to relax physically can help many of us.
I prefer to see a greater emphasis on a plant based whole food diet, the elimination of tobacco and the addition of daily exercise in lieu of more medications. We need to stop avoiding addressing the most important cause of our chronic diseases, food!
So, I have begun to talk to my patients about their food. I’ve referred them to videos by Drs. Neil Barnard, John Mcdougall and Michael Greger. In my previous years, I used to push the drugs. But no more. The drugs do not fix the cause, just the symptoms. Let’s face facts, some people do need the medications. But the majority do not.
CrossFit is wonderful! 
It really pushes you. Sure, I’m one of the oldest, slowest, weakest people in the gym, but everyone is so encouraging! I’m really feeling stronger and more fit now.
@frugaldoctor, as a nurse who administers many drugs, I agree with you! When you look at a particular drug in isolation, it can make perfect sense. But start adding and combining them, and it starts to look rather crazy.
I want to be on as few drugs as possible! My goal is to get off my one med, the BP med, if at all possible, and I have found exercise and weight loss to be key. My HTN may be partially genetic, so I may not be able to completely get off the med, but if I can at least be on a minimal dose, that will be good.
I actually get teary at the thought of what discovering the joys of cycling has brought to me in the last year. I just love it, and it has radically changed my life.
Even plant based food diet doesn’t help people.