Looking for some advice. I have always had white coat syndrome (WCS), not just at the doctor/ hospital but can also give it to myself when taking my own BP readings. In November I went on to Amlodipine (5mg), and this seemed to help but of course, could equally have been the opposite effect to white coat syndrome. In January, I was in hospital for an elective surgery and the pre-open BP readings were high again. After the op, readings were too low for a few hou. So the med did not prevent the hospital WCS. I stopped the med to see what happened but unexpectedly ended up in hospital for something else. Same high blood pressure readings, but also high after surgery. I am otherwise fit and healthy, with all other blood tests being normal.
I have been extremely stressed so my question how to untangle these issues: I don’t feel that doctors are really understanding the underlying perhaps psychological issues.
Has anyone had a similar experience?
Thank you
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Bp12080
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This doesn’t sound surprising. Your b pressure naturally goes up and down depending on what you are doing. Just as an example if you run for a bus then you’d never catch it if your bp remained static. If you’re anxious it goes up (fight or flight).
Hello! I have recently joined this community, but my experience with the BP is rather large since my "BP problems" started about 25 years ago. I hope that you will not mind my spreading some theory here - in my job, I dealt with regulated hydraulic circulatory systems for decades, so maybe understand above average what's going on in human blood circulatory system (similarity is very large).Like in any hydraulic system, the pressure in the blood stream changes in wide limits during the day. If it would be recorded, you would be surprised by what it looks like, as a graph.
My own father has lived most of his life with the BP which would often be on the level 90/60. In one occasion, our family doctor said to me that he is surprised, that my dad can live with such low BP. On the other side, under physical load, BP can be as high as 400/200 (somebody offered these values in the case of having sex, lol). My uncle died at 67 yo, after three strokes, at the BP of 270/170. Just for orientation.
What is the representative value, when BP permanently changes during each and every day?
In the course to eliminate WCS and other disturbances, it is best to measure the BP several times during the day (I know that people have often been advised, not to get obsessed with BP measurement) and to repeat it during a longer period of time (months). Only that way it is possible to understand what value is most frequently measured and it could be a "representative value". In my case, as an example, the value (past few years) is mostly 140/90 to 150/100, with lower limit being 115/75 and upper limit being 190/120 (measured in hospital, after a stressful activity).
It is wrong to measure BP at the doctors, with present WCS, and to bring the decision to prescribe the medication on the base of such measurement. Unfortunately, MD do it exactly that way.
pius i would imagine anyone with anxiety can never get a normal reading of bp as you are stressed before more so during and much more after which is my case, so i dont do it , its something less to worry about, now this will put the cat among the pigions for a few on here, take a low dose asprin ie half a 81mg it puts your mind at rest you are covered just in case ,now im prepared for the backlash lol of what folk read,bleeding etc very rare ,ive been on them 30 years doc scared me once stopped them ended up on dreaded bp meds,never again, back on them now just 40mg once a day its a good back up,could u imagin if asprin was just brought out it would be hailed as a wonder drug, companies/docs would make a fortune,but it costs pennies, just remember you no if u take something if it makes you feel poorly its no good for you,
To peter999...:
I absolutely agree about not measuring BP at all. Also, I agree that "how we feel" is the best sign where we are with our health. If I feel very well with the BP at 150/100, who can explain me that I feel poorly?!
If people still decide to measure the BP regularly, than it should be done after at least 15 mins long sitting on the chair, doing nothing, with the gauge already in the measuring position. In sensitive people, even mounting the gauge immediately before the measurement, can cause stress effect.
There is an interesting thing about the BP, which is not known to MDs, which is very obvious - the BP is the value of secondary importance in blood circulatory system.
What is important parameter and at the same time regulated , is the blood flow-rate. The blood transports oxygen and nutrients to all parts of the body, as everybody knows it. When asleep, the body does not need much of it, so the flow-rate gets smaller via reducing the HR. When we start doing something physically demanding, the HR increases and increases the blood flow-rate. It is true that the BP increases at the same time, but only as natural consequence, not as the regulated parameter. It is true that in the blood vessels, there are "sensors", sensing the BP, but only for the purpose to adjust the vessel diameter to the momentary needs of the flow-rate. We all have experienced the dilatation of blood vessels when doing something physical. The field is so complex, that it strongly requires an interdisciplinary approach, in the course to fully understand it, what the MDs are sometime not ready to do...
Thank you, some good points. I have always assumed that if you can see some low (normal) readings then you don’t have true primary hypertension and BP medications are not necessarily going to help with the spikes (as my own experiences show). For some people I think the multidisciplinary approach is required, to really understand if there is an issue or not. I only don’t feel well when I am worrying about BP….
I do not know why, but I am not able to respond to other people's comments directly. I may be banned to do it, or the algorithm is with the bugs...
If you Google about high BP, you will see that there is no clear answer what causes it. Also, there are about 25 other syndromes or chronic diseases, for which the medicine has no answer about the cause and has no solution how to heal them (from asthma, over cardiac arrhythmia, to Parkinson's disease). How probable is it that the medicine can not detect the cause for 25 different health problems?!? Why is it so?! The doctors have no answer, since the cause is always the same and very complex - the disturbance in functioning of Autonomous Nervous System. You can Google "Dysautonomia international", where, unfortunately, only a limited number of dysautonomias is included.
When we age, the automatics of our body starts working poorer and poorer. The first sign of it is loosing the clear sight (usually at the age of 45), than poorer temperature control (changes of feeling hot and feeling cold), than heart rhythm problems, problems in regulating hormone secretion (thyroid problems before all), ending with problems of regulating body parts position (trembling hands etc).
As for the increased blood pressure, instead of considering it a problem, it could be considered also a "normal" sign of getting older. With our age, the BP has right to continually increase, with the common pattern of being lower BP in the morning, than in the evening. The old "rule" of systolic pressure being 100+age, what peter999999 has also mentioned in one of his posts, was quite OK. Of course, following the profit, it is so good to tell to the people that high BP is a "silent killer" and to make them take chemicals in their bodies for decades.
There are people who absolutely should be on BP medication, and they will improve their risk of disease associated with high BP (usually in combination with other factors). Luckily, such people will see their BP consistently under control. For people like me, it seems a bit more complex and I think I need to push my GP for a bit more investigation…
In essence doctors do what pharmacy companies direct them to do and pharma seem almost entirely into profit making only. You can look back on various reports of just how greedy they are. As you say there are many causes for the same complaint and in nearly every case they seem to address the issue only and not the cause. If you have a headache they medicate to reduce it. If you have high blood pressure they medicate to address it etc. The problem with doing this without finding the true cause is like getting a warning light in your car for low oil and solving the warning light problem by removing the bulb, dangerous. There was a case i read somewhere in the past when experts thought nothing can live in the stomach and so patients who had high stomach acid that may develop into ulcers were treated to reduce the acid (alkaline perhaps?, not hard is it). However, it was discovered later (presumably by someone who did care) that in fact there was bacteria that could survive in the stomach and the patients system was creating higher acid to kill the harmful bacteria. You can imagine how much money pharma made from this. People would have no doubt found immediate relief, and when the stomach tried to produce even more acid because the medication was neutralizing it, no doubt the pain would come back. This would then encourage the patient to take more as it worked so well initially. All the time having no long term benefit other than a sustainable and ever increasing profit for big pharma, and a lifetime of excessive acid and painful stomach for the patient.
If you open the USA forum "HealingWell", on the first page, there is a list of "chronic disease", all of them caused by the dysfunction of autonomous nervous system. Can you identify any of the problems you have, apart of increased BP? I, personally, have most problems with cardiac arrhythmia, than I have sometimes GERD, in several occasions I had the symptoms of Sjogren's syndrome, poor sleep etc.
Hi, to really understand white coat syndrome you need to have it. Mine at the Dr's is often 180+/100+ over the last 20 years then occasionally I get a normal reading , so 20 years ago I was put on a 24 hour monitor and all was fine.Now 20 years later I was invited for a BP test and it was high they panicked the Dr said it was serious so I was put on medication which incidently made me so ill, I complained but they said put up with it, after 3 weeks are more side effects the Dr took me off them, I asked for a 24hour monitor which I did the result was 127/ 80 if I remember correctly, which I thought was OK I'm 60 not diabetic they wanted me to take meds but I refused. I'd recommend you do a 24 hour monitor, then you get a true reading and take it from there. Incidently if I take my own it can be high,why I don't know. Hope this helps
You were obviously able to overcome your white coat syndrome with the 24 hour monitoring. Was this just getting used to it or is the experience just different ?
First reading was terrible after that the average was good, why? I really don't know possibly because you get used to it, it's worth a try, just to see.I hope it goes well
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