Hyper tension / high blood pressure

[Sasquatch]

I am not going to criticise the medical profession nor lecture others but without the cancer and knowing what I do now would I follow the Gerson therapy vegan, style diet to rid myself of the drug dependency? I have to say yes BUT I would not shell out £2300 for the juicer and I think I'd do it slower because I consider some salt is needed to flavour some bland food ie soups our speciality before and now rubbish without a flavour enhancer.

 

Good luck to to anybody bold enough and able to modify their lifestyle it does work but probably not quite as dramatically as in my case.

 

Dave Shakespeare

There's such a thing as "lite Salt" . It contains 50% less sodium and made up with potassium chloride. facebook.com/mortonsalt.

[Donw]

Stick with it Dave we stopped adding salt to food years ago. Obviously you cannot avoid it items such as cheese contain quite a bit and even  a reduced salt stock cube adds quite a bit. However we do take in a lot less and anything heavily salted tastes awful. A lot of vegetables have quite subtle flavours less salt means you start to taste them.

Don

[Mallard60022]

Beware of some pub food, often very salty (makes you thirsty; it's a pub.....) - sorry. It is really noticeable when you cut out salt in home cooking.

Also beware that most BP meds strip your body of potassium (and a load of other things) so you can't win really.

What always amazes me is when I go to our favourite windsurfing place on a small island in the Ionian, is how many old folk there are who drink and smoke but just seem to go on for ever!!

P @ 36E

[New Haven Neil]

+1 on the salt, haven't used it (except when we have the treat of chips - once a month!) for years.  Your taste does acclimatise, as DonW says.  Valsartan was the BP med that worked for me, much less side effects than some of the others, which ranged from extreme lethargy to other more fundamental difficulties.  I take that in the morning and physiotens (moxonidine) at night, which keeps things mostly around the dreaded target of 120/80, and sometimes below.  Until, that is, I'm in the surgery - my GP and myself find it ironic that I get white coat fever, given I worked in the NHS fo rmany years!  I have my own BP monitor, they're cheap now.  A good understanding relationship with your doctor is very helpful.

[Donw]

Other madnesses. A friend was put on Asprin after a heart attack some years ago. The doctor recently prescribed a tablet to conteract the effect of the Asprin on the stomach. He noticed a side effect of the new tablet was an increased risk of heart attack. The friend being a safety officer carefully explained risk assessment to the doctor pointing out that a potential stomach ulcer might be preferable to a second heart attack.Similarly Marion was prescribed an eye drop with a possible side effect of loss of vision. Seeing as the eye drop was preventative rather than treating a problem she declined to take it.

Beware too of generic versions another friend on statins also has a wheat intolerance. The chemists swapped to a generic version which caused lots of problems possibly due to wheat he now has a lot of trouble obtaining the original despite notes on his prescription.

 

I find it amusing that the days when doctors used leeches and blood letting are considered ill treatments but today they will give you all sorts of drugs with no real understanding of what the effects could be.

 

Don

[skipepsi]

 

 

I find it amusing that the days when doctors used leeches and blood letting are considered ill treatments but today they will give you all sorts of drugs with no real understanding of what the effects could be.

 

Don

 

Our Doctor's all do a quick check on the computer before prescribing looking for contra indications for other ailments or drugs

[emt_911]

  

Our Doctor's all do a quick check on the computer before prescribing looking for contra indications for other ailments or drugs

No matter how careful a doctor is, the same combination of drugs for exactly the same problem can have different effects due to the body metabolising them differently

[tetleys]

I'm certainly not ready to knock the medical profession, they have to use a catch all mentality, there really is a very low percentage of their patients I'm sure that would ever consider minor changes to lifestyle let alone my own mega radical approach but receiving my own 'very short term weather forecast' does tend to focus the mind somewhat. I had a call yesterday from the wife of an ex-colleague who had cancer and went The Gerson therapy 100% and shunned chemo, wow that's one hell of a leap of faith, she implorred me to follow her example but no way hosee, I'm on more drugs to treat a problem highlighted by the endoscopic examination that really needs to be gone asap before chemo, if drugs do it in the short term I have to agree.

 

This post has certainly brought the alternatives out in the open and I hope somebody else can regain control of their body as a result.

 

Good or improved health to you all

 

Dave

[Mallard60022]

Well said Dave, best wishes and thanks.

P @ 36E

[Donw]

I don't blame the doctors because the have a pretty busy time seeing patients keeping up with all the drugs is not possible. The problem is we have a culture which says problem take this, side effects take something else when often lifesytle changes could have eased things and reduced the need for drugs.

 

Don

[tetleys]

I'm hitting Amazon lately for specialist potions and 'snake oil' as part of our complimentary medicine approach and I've just taken delivery of a well reviewed home use blood pressure monitor, I'm very satisfied with the quality, after all we can get a digital vernier for under a tenner from Aldi that's easier to use, a heck of a lot cheaper and just as accuarate as an engineer's micrometer.

 

Anyway, I used it today to check I'm still on track, I'm feeling a bit light headed and thought I'd gone too low, my pressure is good for a man in his 50's and I'm almost 63 and I suppose I am a bit 'under the weather' recently and my resting pulse rate is gradually dropping towards the sub 60 which is also excellent for my age. For about £ 15 delivered and that includes a set of batteries I can self monitor at ease and stay on track, highly recommended but of course any problems should always be referred to a doctor.

 

The sun is shining and so it's on with the walking boots and hit those rights of way.

 

Dave

[Sasquatch]

There's usually a cheaper alternative, which leaves more money for the fun stuff! 

Hiking is the best thing for anyone. When I lived in Saltdean on the south downs outside Brighton I would walk home over the hills every night after work for about 2 hours.

Blood sugars never strayed from normal and I was always very relaxed and clear headed!Needless to say blood presure was perfect also.

Off out for a hike too today up Lower Table Rock, Rouge Valley, OR. Nice!

 

Keep it up Dave and enjoy the sunshine.

 

Shaun.

[Poor Old Bruce]

we stopped adding salt to food years ago.

 

 

+1 on the salt, haven't used it (except when we have the treat of chips - once a month!) for years. 

Be aware folks that some of us do actually need salt. A while ago SWMBO had a go at me for eating too many crisps so I stopped, ten days later it was painful to walk. If I had gone to my GP, I wonder if he would have dignosed gout and cut me down on salt even more. Well done to Dave for having the commitment to persevere and long may he continue but what works for one may not be a universal cure.

 

The salt thing appears to run in the family as my mother, her sister and her sister's daughter have suffered from a defficiency.

[tetleys]

I am very mindful of my radical diet used through necessity to control or hopefully improve my condition until I receive chemo, I could not afford to patiently await test results at the rate my liver and body was failing and the diet is without doubt extremley effective but I am aware of possible leaching out of my body of vital minerals and vitimins. I am moitoring my blood pressure twice daily to ensure it remains stable plus I shall be receiving regular and comprehensive blood tests that will highlight any defficiency.

 

As far as salt is concerned we now check everything and discovered that my previous regular carton tomato juice contains a fair bit so now buy Pasata 99.5%  tomato paste which we add to soup so even that has a salt element, I eat only sour dough bread and rye bread since ALL others contain salt to help yeast rise as does all breakfast cereals. I don't think anybody need concern themselves of salt defficiency in a modern diet consiting of processed ingredients which is probably why I never could reduce my blood pressure by assumed sensibale eating.

 

I've said all along that my special circumstances and following radical diet lead to the exceptional results but the pressure is remaining stable and is very good for a man of any age let alone a wrinkley like me.

 

Dave