The Connection Between Hypertension and Heart Disease

FULL TRANSCRIPTION:

Maggie Rodriguez:

Many forms of heart disease can be treated and prevented by living a healthy lifestyle and one leading risk factor that’s important to keep an eye on is high blood pressure. Joining us now with more on this is Dr. Nektarios Demetriou from Millennium Physician Group. Welcome back, Doctor.

Dr. Nektarios Demetriou:

Thank you. Good morning.

Maggie Rodriguez:

Let’s start with the connection between high blood pressure and heart disease.

Dr. Nektarios Demetriou:

Sure. Well, so basically when you’re talking about high blood pressure, what are you actually doing? When you’re measuring blood pressure, you are really trying to measure what the pressure is inside the heart in an indirect way. So we measure it through an artery that’s not actually directly in the heart. So there could be some distortion in regards to that number. But think about it like this. Really, what you’re trying to do is if I can give you an idea of a balloon. You blow air into a balloon, you’re increasing the pressure. That balloon is your heart. That’s what you’re trying to measure.

Maggie Rodriguez:

So you don’t want that?

Dr. Nektarios Demetriou:

You do not want that.

Maggie Rodriguez:

You do not want that.

Dr. Nektarios Demetriou:

And if you think about that. If you keep pushing air into a balloon that doesn’t want to blow up high, you’re going to start distorting everything else inside of it. So if you think about a heart, it’s got chambers, it’s got valves, all precisely set to where they need to be. You start increasing the pressure in any of those chambers, starts distorting the function of those vessels and of those valves and everything else. Now, starts affecting everything. So your main pump in your body is now a little bit distorted and is not functioning like it should.

Maggie Rodriguez:

Well, I have obvious symptoms if my blood pressure is high, how will I know I have it?

Dr. Nektarios Demetriou:

Sometimes you don’t. The only real way to know is to go to your doctor periodically, frequently and to get checked. And also prevention. Once you know you’ve got high blood pressure, you can prevent it, but some people just don’t know because they just don’t have symptoms. So the earlier you see your doctor in life, the better off you’ll be.

Maggie Rodriguez:

What are some things that we can do to prevent high blood pressure?

Dr. Nektarios Demetriou:

So there’s a lot of things. Predominantly speaking, we need to look at ourselves. We need to look at our diets. Are we eating a lot of fast food? Are we having a lot of salt in our diet? Remember, canned soups are full of salt, right?

Maggie Rodriguez:

Sodium, yeah.

Dr. Nektarios Demetriou:

And salt will raise your blood pressure up. So you’ve got the dietary aspect as well. If you think you do have a little bit of high blood pressure, there are things on the market that you can take as well like nutrients, et cetera. But for the most part, you need to be conscious about what you’re putting in your body. You need to try to stay active. Your body loves movement. Try not to stay stagnant, and really be conscious about what you need in life to get going rather than what you are given in regards to, if somebody gives you plate full of food, do you really eat all of it? Or what you really should you just eat?

Maggie Rodriguez:

Genetically, are you predispositioned to have it if your mom has high blood pressure? Are you more likely to have high blood pressure?

Dr. Nektarios Demetriou:

Not necessarily.

Maggie Rodriguez:

Okay.

Dr. Nektarios Demetriou:

Some people are… There are genetics involved with some people that’s true. But for the most part, blood pressure, hypertension, heart disease is multifactorial. Meaning there are many, many facets that actually contribute to that whole entire process.

Maggie Rodriguez:

So besides changing your lifestyle, if you go to the doctor and you realize you have high blood pressure, what is the course from there?

Dr. Nektarios Demetriou:

Well, obviously the first recommendation is lifestyle changes. Then obviously the second one would be if that’s not really being successful with accomplishing a low blood pressure number, well, then medication comes into play. And the goal would be to get your blood pressure roundabout to the 120, over 80 range. That’s typically what we consider normal. Anything above that is considered high blood pressure or elevated blood pressure.

Maggie Rodriguez:

Do you take the medication in forever? Are you on it all the time?

Dr. Nektarios Demetriou:

Well, I hate to say this, but for the most part, I would say to you are, however, if you make changes and you lose weight and you watch your diet and you’re monitoring with your doctor, the discussion can be, if I get to this point, can we come back on the blood pressure medicine and see if my blood pressure hold? And if it does, maybe look at titrating it down. So you do have a level of control in that regard, but some people just don’t. But I think the discussion there would need to be between you and your PCP.

Maggie Rodriguez:

Sounds good. Dr. Nektarios Demetriou, as always, thank you so much.

Dr. Nektarios Demetriou:

You’re welcome.

Maggie Rodriguez:

And if you would like information to find a physician, schedule an appointment, please visit millenniumphysician.com. Daytime will be right back.

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