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Now to slightly backtrack here, let me be
slightly more explicit as to what exactly
malignant hypertension is. Now in the
various stages or levels of hypertension,
malignant hypertension is the worst. Now
this is a sobering thought believe me and
one that does tend to concentrate the mind
slightly but fear not it isn't as bad
nowadays as it was 40 years.
Forty years ago if you were given a
diagnosis of malignant hypertension then by
and large your doctor may just as well have
given you a death sentence. Given the fact
that as far as most people are concerned the
ideal level for blood pressure or
hypertension is what they call 120/80 then
if your blood pressure readings exceed
200/130 then you can understand why there is
this panic when the doctors encounter a
patient with a reading this high.
In my case the reading was in the region of
216/160 so you can understand that at this
point there were alarm bells ringing all
over the place when the doctors got round to
dealing with me.
As I mentioned earlier, forty odd years ago
if you were diagnosed with a level of
hypertension this high then there was very
little the doctors could do about it but
thankfully in today's medical climate and
with today's research there is an awful lot
they can do when they encounter a level of
blood pressure this high.
Now medication will only take you so far and
there comes a point when will power and the
desire to live takes over and you force
yourself into some fairly major lifestyle
changes. As my cardiologist said to me five
years ago you have a simple choice to make
in that you had better start making some
lifestyle changes soon or you will have to
accept the fact that you will be taking some
fairly strong medication for the rest of
your life.
Now given the fact that I'm a firm believer
in that if you spend a fair amount of time
ingesting foreign chemicals into your body
then you are going to have to accept the
fact that sooner or later there are going to
be some fairly serious reactions to this and
some fairly hefty side effects, then you can
understand why I am now a firm believer in
lifestyle changes.
Nothing was changed overnight and in fact
some lifestyle changes took longer to
implement than was ideal but at least five
years later I can safely say that at no
other time during my six monthly checkups
over the last 18 months has my blood
pressure reading ever been greater than
120/80.
So go on make that lifestyle change it
doesn't have to be major, start small and
build up but at least start somewhere.
High Blood Pressure, causes, cures, treatment, and
more.......
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