Hello John,

 BL> When I started off, my BP was 170/110 and 10Kg later it was
 BL> 150/95. Of course, an artery in my heart was blocked as well...
 BL> I suspect that the poor old heart was trying to clear it. After
 BL> the stent cleared the heart I came down to 130/80.

 JT> AFAIK, I don't have any blockages, (at my age I would bloody
 JT> well hope not!). 

  I'm not saying that everyone with high BP has blocked arteries, just
that in my case I suspect that it was the other way around: a blocked
artery in the heart caused the high BP. On the angiogram, I could see
where small veins around the blockage had grown to try and bypass it.
I hope that the blockage was just bad luck, and not something I can
expect annually.

 BL> The trouble is that you can't "feel" it.

 JT> I've not been able to *reliably* tell from feel alone. It
 JT> sometimes goes both ways too. "Feel" only works on the extremes
 JT> as far as I have observed. 

  In my case, it's almost the reverse: if I feel stressed and tense BP
is low, if I feel at ease it's high. It's mad. I just can't tell. I
can "feel" a high pulse rate.

 BL> Another time I'll be perfectly relaxed and it measures high...
 BL> but on average it behaves the way you'd expect.

 JT> Yeah, I've noticed that as well, you have to take the average
 JT> over several days to be able to come to any real conclusion.
 JT> There are other factors as well though, just after and just
 JT> before you've been to the loo, when you eat, what you've been
 JT> doing just before the measurement.

  Yes! As I said, the measurement with the least variation is the one
taken first thing in the morning. Some of the things are surprising.
Every afternoon before tea, I water the pot plants. I had thought this
was a toally relaxing pastime... but it puts up the BP!

 JT> Most important is the sitting position when measuring, you have
 JT> to sit properly at a table, any arm will do, although I've been
 JT> told the left works better. Same as far as I've been able to
 JT> tell though. 

  I don't measure any difference left to right, standing or lying
down. I was told that the inportant thing is to have the arm on the
same level as the heart. If you hold your arm up, you lose pressure. 

 BL> The human average is 72.

 JT> Oh good, then I'm "normal" for a human. I was told 70 was
 JT> fucked.

  90-rest is fucked. To be a good shooter, you need a pulse rate of 55
and a fit human is around 60-rest but it depends on the person. Mine
has always been around 60-rest, I've never been really fit, and I had
a heart attack at 57, so figure...

  The other odd thing is that my heart has large arteries. The doctor
commented on it (but the actual size he mentioned didn't register in
my memory). A large *blocked* artery!

 JT> I used to live with a constant 145/92 (or close) all the time.
 JT> I've dropped to around 125/83 (or close) now, and sometimes
 JT> I've seen it lower.

 BL> That's only borderline hypertensive for a 40 year-old, but it's
 BL> better lower.

 JT> That puts too far away on the wrong side of borderline for a 23
 JT> YO. Which was I think when he first noticed it.

  23! In my mind, I imagined you older. 

  In that case you are one of those people with inherited high BP!

  I don't think doctors have much of a clue about heart disease, and
they're grasping at indicators. I remember being told the same thing
about ulcers, 15 years ago. They were caused by acid (it's cholesterol
in hearts), and the indicators were hereditary, what you ate, smoking,
stress... the same things they tell you about hearts. In fact, ulcers
are caused by a germ. Get rid of the germ... ulcer cured forever.

  I'm not saying that the heart indicators don't exist, or that if you
follow the best medical and lifestyle advice you won't get a result (I
lived with my ulcers for 15 years and avoided them pretty well), but
as far as I am concerned, nothing about heart disease is written on
stone. It may be that inherited high pulse rate and BP means bugger
all... your body may be designed to run that way.

  The catch is, you *have* to follow the best advice, and it's pretty
obvious that it's plain good advice anyway: don't smoke, low fat diet,
steady daily exercise, keep the weight down, manage stress. Whatta
mongrel.

 BL> 125/83 is okay... in fact the low differential means you are
 BL> not asking much of your heart. 130/80 is normal.

 JT> Cool, then most of the time I'm just fine.

  At your age I weighed 63 kg (19 in the m/d^2 calculation), had a low
pulse, low BP, under tremendous stress and smoking 60 a day. At 35
(1975) I went as close to a nervous breakdown as I ever want to go and
made a large change in lifestyle (I left Pye). As a consultant I was
still under stress and got ulcers. At 40 (1980) it was so bad I
thought it was stomach cancer. I gave up smoking and stopped
worrying... and went up to 86kg but my BP was 120/70 as late as
1990 when I had a complete heart test. The cardiologist told me to
lose 3kg and I did. Seven years later I had the heart attack.

  With hindsight, the only things I would have done differently was to
never smoke and to keep my weight at 72kg... but the 83kg limit was
with the blessing of a Professor of Cardiology. Figure...

Regards,
Bob
___ Blue Wave/QWK v2.12
@EOT:

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