Inside Lower Blood Pressure Medications: The Real Dangers

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Most people taking medications for lower blood pressure are only too well aware of their side effects. Those with rising blood pressure but who are not on the drugs are justifiably wary of them. In health forums you can hear the desperation of people struggling to live with both high blood pressure and its treatment. Sometimes it’s hard to say which is worse. To complicate matters further, many cases of hypertension require multiple medications, compounding the potential side effects.

There are several different classes of blood pressure medication and each has its own set of side effects. The following are just a few of the more common types of medication and the problems they can cause:
Beta-blockers, one of the oldest and most common hypertension drugs, frequently produce fatigue, shortness of breath, dizziness, cold hands and feet, slow heartbeat and loss of libido and/or impotence.

Diuretics can alter blood chemistry and cause a number of side effects including dizziness, nausea, digestive problems, muscle pain, skin rash and impotence. Long-term use of diuretics can lead to gout, a very painful condition. Diuretics are often used in combination with other blood pressure drugs.

ACE inhibitors can cause skin rash, loss of taste, a chronic dry, hacking cough, and, rarely, kidney damage.
Side effects of calcium channel blockers may include heart palpitations, swollen ankles, constipation, dizziness or headache.
It's important to note that some of these effects are rare and not everyone suffers severely. Few, however, escape them altogether. Side effects run the range from mildly annoying to completely debilitating.

What could be worse?
While side effects justifiably capture a lot of attention due to their immediacy, they may not pose the greatest risk of high blood pressure medications. This may belong to the potential and often hidden dangers in their long-term use. High blood pressure is considered a chronic condition, which often results in a long-term or even lifetime prescription. While side effects usually appear quickly, more severe consequences may take years to develop.

Beta-blockers are a good case in point. For decades they served as the front-line drug in the fight against hypertension. Literally millions upon millions of people have been prescribed them. But in 2006 beta-blockers were withdrawn for this use in the U.K. after new studies showed that they actually increase the risk of heart attack and stroke (compared to other blood pressure drugs).

Worse still, beta-blockers have been shown to increase the risk of diabetes by up to 50% and are blamed for 8000 needless cases of diabetes a year in the U.K. alone. Experts now know that beta-blockers have killed many thousands of people. Many doctors are aware of these problems and are switching to newer drugs but for many others in the United States and around the world it’s still business as usual.

"New and improved"?

What about these newer drugs? Doctors and drug companies claim that newer drugs are much safer and have fewer side effects. Of course, that’s what they said about beta-blockers when they first appeared; they were “revolutionary”. But new does not always mean improved or better.

Ironically, new drugs are actually the riskiest. Drugs are tested – in most cases – as far as practically possible. But the only true test comes through long-term use by large numbers of real patients. Medications can take 10 years, 20 years, even a lifetime, to reveal their consequences – just as happened with beta-blockers.

That this will happen again with some of today's new drugs is almost certain.
Shane Ellison, known as "The People's Chemist" has a Master's degree in organic chemistry and first-hand experience in drug research and design. In his article "Are Your Blood Pressure Meds Killing You?" he reports that calcium channel blockers, one of the newer beta-blocker alternatives, put users at greater risk of heart failure by preventing calcium from entering the heart.

What’s more cancer is also a possibility. In 1966, The National Institutes of Health issued a warning that, "Postmenopausal women who take calcium channel blockers have twice the risk of developing breast cancer than other women."

Statins are another good example. The top-selling class of drug in the U.S., statins were developed to reduce cholesterol levels but are now prescribed increasingly to lower blood pressure as well. Guidelines for the use of statins now apply to 36 million Americans, not counting millions more who will wind up taking them for hypertension.

Such widespread use is in spite of the fact that many users experience severe reactions to statins including painful muscle cramps, depression and liver damage. On top of that, many experts, even some doctors and drug industry insiders, question the effectiveness of statins as well as the validity of their testing.
Do the ends justify the means?

Of course doctors are not ignorant of these facts, nor do they prescribe dangerous drugs just to make their users' lives miserable. They are well aware of the risks and side effects (though often refusing to recognize their full extent). But hypertension is a dangerous condition, which is more certain to cause misery and shorten lives, sometimes suddenly, when left uncontrolled. They reckon, often correctly, that the risks and side effects of drugs are better than the alternative.
To be sure, these medications have improved and saved the lives of countless hypertension sufferers with life-threatening conditions. But what about the millions with moderate or borderline hypertension? What about the millions more who could be better helped through support for a healthier lifestyle? And what about the aging population who naturally experience a slight elevation in blood pressure?

Do the ends still justify the means? In all of these cases, more often than not, patients are immediately prescribed medication with barely a second thought. It’s no surprise that blood pressure drugs occupy several positions among the top 10 best-selling medications.

Dr. John Lee, a family practitioner, is one of a growing number of medical professionals to speak out. In an article for the Virginia Hopkins Health Watch, "What Your Doctor May Not Tell You About Blood Pressure", he writes:
I believe – and there is plenty of research to support me – that these drugs have just as good a chance of killing you as the high blood pressure does, especially if you don't really need them.

Every case is different and there are plenty of times when the use of blood pressure medications is justified. This can be a difficult decision but the guiding principle should always be that drugs are a last resort, not the routine treatment that they are.
Click here to discover a genuinely effective way to lower blood pressure naturally.

Music For Lower Blood Pressure, Lower Cholesterol,And More!

“Take 15 minutes of Beatles in the morning and a half hour of Mozart at bedtime.” Could this become a genuine doctor’s prescription in years to come? The idea is not too far-fetched: a growing amount of evidence shows that listening to music not only affects our moods – able to relax us or stimulate us, depending on the type of music – but actually produces measurable changes in physiological processes.

Music’s ability to lower blood pressure, for example, has long been recognized. But the effects were assumed to be due to relaxation alone and thus only temporary. Recent research, however, proves it’s these assumptions that are short-lived. An important study from the University of Florence in Italy found that listening to relaxing music for 30 minutes a day led to significant drops in blood pressure throughout the day after four weeks. These results show the effects of listening to music to be cumulative and long lasting, not temporary.

It now appears that lower blood pressure may be just the tip of an iceberg representing a whole range of benefits to be gained from listening to music. In December 2008, researchers at the Center for Preventive Cardiology at Maryland University published findings showing that listening to music also lowers LDL, the so-called bad cholesterol.

Music’s reducing effects on both blood pressure and cholesterol are produced by its ability to relax and expand blood vessels. The diameter of blood vessels in the upper arms of the Maryland subjects expanded by an average of 26% after listening to music they enjoyed. The resulting improvement in blood flow not only has the obvious effect of reducing blood pressure but also helps prevent the buildup of clots and harmful cholesterol.

In addition to simple mental and physical relaxation, this beneficial dilation of blood vessels indicates that listening to music releases a powerful substance into the bloodstream: nitric oxide. Nitric oxide is a gas produced by our cells that not only helps to regulate blood flow and blood chemistry but also aids the immune system in fighting infection and tumors and is an important neurotransmitter in the brain.

Another therapeutic practice implicated in the production of nitric oxide is slow breathing, with which music can be combined to even greater effect. Participants in the Italian study practiced slow, controlled breathing while listening to music. This type of breathing – often mistakenly referred to as “exercise” – is deeply relaxing but, again, the less obvious but more powerful element at work may be an invisible gas.

Nitric oxide is a potent substance deeply involved in cardiac health and other crucial physiological processes. For these reasons, it is the object of wide-ranging research by scientists and pharmaceutical companies. But natural practices like listening to music and slow breathing that stimulate the production of nitric oxide along with mental and physical relaxation may show even greater promise.

Michael Miller, the director of the music study at Maryland University states, “We were looking for cheaper, non-pharmacological aids to help us improve our patients’ heart health, and we think this is the prescription.”
Discover more about music and slow breathing for lower blood pressure and cholesterol, stress relief and much more.

How Breathing Helps To Regulate Blood Pressure - And How You Can Take Advantage Of It

The ability to control blood pressure and other body processes naturally is the holy grail of alternative health practitioners. Now some of their claims once dismissed as preposterous are gaining mainstream respect. In particular, it seems they’re on to something with abdominal breathing and "chi-kung" - exercises that use breathing to heal and strengthen the heart and entire body.

Some of this should be no surprise. We all recognize that our respiratory rate increases in sync with our heartbeat (and blood pressure, although this we don’t feel) in response to fear, anger or other severe stress. The respiratory and circulatory systems are inextricably linked. So it seems only logical that heartbeat and blood pressure should also decrease in response to slowing the rate of breathing.
Of course, things that simply "have to be true" have a habit of turning out to be wrong but, luckily, this is a case where logic proves out. Clinical research confirms that breathing, among its many other benefits, does indeed influence the circulatory system and helps to regulate blood pressure.

How it does this is where science and alternative or Eastern medicine part ways. According to Eastern principles, breathing slowly and deeply into the abdomen strengthens the heart by stimulating "chi", the mysterious energy said to be the life force. But despite the compelling effects of acupuncture, also said to be due to chi, there is no scientific evidence for its existence.

While chi remains a mystery there are several concrete physiological processes that can account for the effect of slow breathing on blood pressure:
Our tension level is reflected in our breathing. When stressed we breathe quickly and shallowly, which builds up muscle tension, especially in the chest area. This constricts blood vessels and raises blood pressure.
Therapeutic slow breathing relaxes muscles deep into the chest, allowing major blood vessels to open and relieve pressure on the heart. The result is lower blood pressure.

What is often called abdominal breathing also promotes circulation and can reduce blood pressure by taking some of the load off the heart. This should more correctly be called “diaphragmatic breathing”.
The diaphragm is a large sheet of muscle separating the thorax or chest cavity from the abdomen. What happens in diaphragmatic breathing is that the diaphragm expands downward to draw the breath deep into the lungs. This rhythmic expansion and contraction of the diaphragm, the largest and most powerful muscle in the body, acts as a membrane pump to aid the circulation of blood, especially venous blood from abdomen to thorax or upper chest area. With its large surface area the diaphragm can move a surprising quantity of blood.

The third way that slow breathing can lower blood press and benefit the heart is chemical, not mechanical, but stress again plays a role. Dr. David Anderson, a researcher with the National Institutes of Health, explains that under chronic stress people tend to take shallow breaths and hold them without being aware of it. He calls this inhibitory breathing. Breathing in this way knocks the blood chemistry out of balance, increasing its acidity. Acidic blood makes the kidneys less efficient at pumping out sodium and this in turn raises blood pressure.

Dr. Anderson believes that slow breathing may be able to reverse this effect. He says that people practicing slow breathing "may be changing their blood gases and the way their kidneys are regulating salt."
The remarkable thing is that each of these processes mimics the action of one or more blood pressure medications, but in a totally natural way without side effects.
Here's more good news: you don"t need to become a chi-kung master to take advantage of slow breathing. Simple breathing techniques have been developed that anyone can use to help reduce and control their own blood pressure in just minutes a day.
Although there are programs available that can make learning faster, easier and more effective, anyone can benefit from these techniques on their own almost immediately.

The basics are simple:
First, simply relax. Listening to slow, soothing music can help. Plus, music can actually help regulate your breathing as it wants to synchronize with the music's slow beat and tempo.

As you relax, slow your breathing as far as comfortable. Don't go beyond your comfort threshold.

After becoming comfortable with a slower rate of breathing start to extend the length of your exhale. Relax totally into it when exhaling. Shoot for gradually extending your it to about twice the length of your inhale.

Don't use any form of counting or other timekeeping; it will only disturb your relaxation. As long as your timing is in the ballpark you will feel the benefits.
Continue for 15 minutes and repeat several times a week. Your breathing rate will gradually decrease a little each time while your benefits increase.

That's all it takes; just 15 minutes a day. If this seems hard to believe it's important to know that experience with artificial heart pumps has shown that resting the heart, even a diseased one, for just short periods can have amazing healing effects.

What's more, clinical trials reveal that blood pressure reductions from slow breathing are cumulative. At first, they tend to be only temporary, like the effects of simple relaxation. But over the course of several weeks they build up, lasting longer each time until blood pressure remains lower around the clock. Isn't that worth a pleasant 15 minutes a day?

Discover the quick and easy way to slow breathing for natural lower blood pressure.

The Key To Lower Blood Pressure: How Your Breathing AffectsYour Circulation

Could our breathing hold the secret to achieving lower blood pressure naturally? Many researchers think so and they have a growing amount of evidence to back them up. What’s more, these are not the claims of alternative health promoters or any of the other usual suspects but those of doctors and scientists published in peer-reviewed medical journals.

It seems that the close connection between our respiratory and circulatory systems, long recognized and used by ancient cultures, does have scientific validity. We know logically that our heartbeat and breathing rate increase in unison in response to physical demands or strong emotions such as fear, anger, or panic. What we’re not able to feel is the corresponding increase in our blood pressure. This is a natural response to stress in preparation for fight or flight.
We usually think in terms of our breathing following our heart rate/blood pressure as it goes up but why would the reverse not be true? Why would heart rate and blood pressure not follow breathing – and why not down as well as up?

There was no mystery in this for ancient peoples. You may have heard of the incredible feats of certain Indian yogis: their ability to slow their heartbeats to the point at which it appears to stop, for instance. This requires complete mastery of mind and body but there is one tool they use above all to accomplish this feat: their breathing.

The yogis have learned that slowing their breathing calms the heart, mind and nervous system. By reducing their respiratory rate to less than one breath per minute they are able to achieve a sort of “suspended animation”.
It takes a lifetime of discipline to reach this level but virtually anyone can learn to control their breathing within practical limits. Could this be of use to ordinary people to self-regulate their blood pressure? It was with this question in mind that researchers set out several years ago to find out if controlled breathing could be used to benefit the heart and blood pressure.

Their findings are promising, to say the least. A report in the April, 2001, Journal of Human Hypertension announced: "Breathing-control lowers blood pressure". The study, backed up by at least seven further clinical trials, concludes that short sessions of only 10 to 15 minutes a day of a therapeutic type of breathing is "an effective non-pharmacologic modality to reduce BP". In simple English, it works!
The method, known as "slow breathing", begins to reduce blood pressure at rates below 10 breaths per minute. A specific breathing pattern involving prolonged exhalation also plays an important role. Results improve as the breathing rate drops further but there is no need to become a yogi; maximum benefits are obtained at rates that almost everyone can achieve comfortably.

Using a simple method that guides breathing with the help of musical tones, people with no training were able to obtain impressive drops in blood pressure. The most successful have averaged reductions of 36 points systolic and 20 points diastolic. This is a phenomenal result that can only be equaled by a barrage of blood pressure medications. Average reductions across the board are a bit less but still very impressive.

Equally important is the surprising finding that the effects of slow breathing are cumulative. The reductions tend to be short-lived at first but build up over several weeks until they start to last around the clock. This makes slow breathing much more useful than simple relaxation, the effects of which are usually only temporary.

One other result may be more surprising still; a follow-up study showed that a massive 82% of resistant hypertensives – people who had failed to respond to other forms of treatment – responded positively to slow breathing. This result was published in the American Journal of Hypertension in June 2003. It indicates that slow breathing helps a broad range of people with high blood pressure, not just those whose hypertension may be caused by breathing problems, as many had believed.
With potential like this for many millions of hypertension sufferers you would expect slow breathing to spread like wildfire. After all, it offers so many advantages, not to mention additional benefits like stress and anxiety relief, with virtually no downside. Slow breathing has already helped thousands to avoid, reduce or eliminate potentially dangerous blood pressure medications.

Ironically, even with prestigious institutions like the Mayo Clinic and The American Heart Association have putting their influence behind the method, slow breathing has proved slow to catch on. It can appear difficult to learn and impractical. Luckily, new developments have emerged that allow virtually anybody to quickly and easily take advantage of this unique, totally natural method.
Discover more about using slow breathing to lower blood pressure, stress relief and much more.