Is my doctor crazy? Isn't this high blood pressure?

Ok last Friday night I noticed my feet and ankles were swollen and I have never had trouble with that before and I'm 41 years old. Well then Saturday I went to work and all day I had a headache, felt lightheaded and was really tired. Some people told me it might be my blood pressure so on my way home from work that night I stopped at the drug store and took my blood pressure and it was 158/104 pulse 93. Well then I continued to take it over the next few days and the top number was in the upper 130's to lower 140's and the bottom number was in the 80's. And my pulse was anywhere from 85 to 110. Well yesterday I went to my doctor and told her this and gave her all the readings and she said that the first one was bad but being in the 130's and 140's wasn't that bad and did not need medicine. She advised me to watch the salt that I eat. Watch the caffine that I drink, to stop smoking and to try to excerise and lose weight. Read below.........

Well I haven't had caffine since last Friday, I haven't been smoking but a pack a week if that. I am overweight and have gained alot lately and it is hard for me to excerise because I get out of breath easy.

So my real question here is the doctor crazy and it's not high enough to worry about and if it's not, what do I do when it is up and I feel like crap. It's hard for me to be at work when I have a horrible headache, am lightheaded, have chest pressure (not real bad but enough to annoy me) and am very tired???

I don't think your doctor is crazy, but I do believe she is not informed and does not understand nutrition, so she treats symptoms and not "root causes" of problems like the one you are experiencing. A blood pressure check is what it is at that moment. If you have been exercising, it will be different than if you are sitting still in a chair for a few minutes. It's always best to take your blood pressure at rest. At a pulse rate of 93, it sounds like you may have been exerting yourself a little before you took the pressure.

I agree that you should watch the salt, but not in the way the doctor means. Salt does NOT affect blood pressure. Ask your doctor to site just one study that shows it does. It is a myth and again, it's ignorance of nutrition when doctors or anyone tells you salt affects your blood pressure.

You need salt. Salt is where your body gets the chloride ion to make stomach acid. Salt is also necessary for your adrenal glands to work properly. The type of salt you eat is very important. If you use the typical white table salt Morton salt company makes, it's junk and bad for you. It contains lots of chemicals, has all the minerals removed and is toxic to the body. Air dried sea salt is what you should be consuming each day. For every 1 quart of water you consume, you should be consuming 1/4 teaspoon of the air dried sea salt. This salt contains electrolytes and good sodium.

In regard to your watching the caffeine, that is good advice. Caffeine causes you to produce excess cortisol and steals the precursor pregnenalone and keeps you from producing the steroid hormones that include sex hormones. The smoking is the worst thing you can do to your body. The 4,000 chemicals in it combine with other chemicals to provide you with a perfect cocktail of toxins that cause inflammation and infection. 99% of all Cancer comes from infections. The constant bombardment of chemicals and irritations from smoking is something the body just cannot overcome, especially if you are not getting good nutrition.

Smoking will cause high blood pressure. Processed foods cause heart disease.

I strongly suggest you go see a good Certified Nutritional Therapist to help you. They can determine exactly what you are deficient in and make diet and supplement recommendations.

good luck

Tamitha, those machines in the drug store are not reliable. Go to any FIRE STATION any time, and they'll be HAPPY to take your BP, and also advise you. Usually high BP is a "silent killer", so you having all these symptoms doesn't sound right.
Get a second opinion. ASAP.
Bless you and Good luck. :)

my mum had high blood pressure and she was told by her doctor to take a few weeks off from work because that was causing her high blood pressure...if you arent happy then go and see another doctor? it doesnt sound right to me either that you only needed to stop smoking and lose weight etc

That is a little high, but not bad.... certainly not high enough for your symptoms to be from high blood pressure.

Swollen ankles can happen in hot, humid weather - especially once we get around 40 years old.

Do what she asked, and it will probably come down to normal.

It is a high blood pressure problems , consult another doctor to be sure. . and I guess that the last reply was helpful enough

you should get your doctor to check it out, haha do NOT trust gas station things, i got stuck in one before : not fun.

get second opinion, if you feel that bad, don't sit and suffer, go see someone different

Get a second opinion! It is high blood pressure.

all doctors are crazy

High blood pressure is usually higher then 145/85. I had that blood pressure for a long time and finally got my doctor to give me Altace. Maybe you can ask her since it will not hurt you if you take it and don't really need it - it also protects your kidneys, and just having it will put your mind at ease. Good luck, I know that is scary.

listen to your doctor, they didn't do years of medical school for nothing. if you are not happy go to another doctor, or you could go and see your pharmacist again and have it checked there again. when you are stressed it will be higher. if you have been having alot of caffeine it will be higher, if you smoke it will be higher. She wants you to do something to lower your blood pressure before she starts medicating you. There are things you can do, like cutting out salt, changing your diet, exercising, limiting your caffeine and alcohol and of course the one i hate stop smoking. If you do all these things then your blood pressure will come down and you will feel better. you can read up on the net what they suggest for high blood pressure and it will say the same thing. you are just like that its not at a dangerous level yet. it is manageable :o)

The top number (systolic pressure) is the amount of pressure within your circulatory system that it takes to move blood though the heart and system. The bottom number (diastolic pressure) is the heart at rest and the pressure within the system. Your top number in 130 is borderline for hypertension. You might check your blood sugar. Could be you're a closet diabetic or headed in that direction. Had some of the same symptoms.

158/104 is definitely high but a lot of things can contribute to that. you could have been nervous about what the number was and that can actually make it go higher! i've been to the doc's and nervous about appointments and my blood pressure went through the roof but later was fine!

130's isn't a bad number. the old 120/80 is just a GUIDE as to what is good. don't worry about 130 if the doctor says don't worry!

pulses vary on a lot of things! if you're overweight or a coffee drinker, it will be higher! follow the doctor's orders on this!

personally i think it's easy to freak out but try and have faith in your doctor! or if you don't, get a second opinion!

Well be the hokey farmers this is high. Yes.This doctor is crazy.Blood pressure refers to the force exerted by circulating blood on the walls of blood vessels, and constitutes one of the principal vital signs. The pressure of the circulating blood decreases as blood moves through arteries, arterioles, capillaries, and veins; the term blood pressure generally refers to arterial pressure, i.e., the pressure in the larger arteries, arteries being the blood vessels which take blood away from the heart. Arterial pressure is most commonly measured via a sphygmomanometer, which uses the height of a column of mercury to reflect the circulating pressure (see Non-invasive measurement). Blood pressure values are reported in either kilopascals (kPa) or in millimetres of mercury (mmHg), despite the fact that many modern vascular pressure devices no longer use mercury.

The systolic arterial pressure is defined as the peak pressure in the arteries, which occurs near the beginning of the cardiac cycle; the diastolic arterial pressure is the lowest pressure (at the resting phase of the cardiac cycle). The average pressure throughout the cardiac cycle is reported as mean arterial pressure; the pulse pressure reflects the difference between the maximum and minimum pressures measured.

Typical values for a resting, healthy adult human are approximately 120 mmHg (16 kPa) systolic and 80 mmHg (11 kPa) diastolic (written as 120/80 mmHg, and spoken as "one twenty over eighty") with large individual variations. These measures of arterial pressure are not static, but undergo natural variations from one heartbeat to another and throughout the day (in a circadian rhythm); they also change in response to stress, nutritional factors, drugs, or disease. Hypertension refers to arterial pressure being abnormally high, as opposed to hypotension, when it is abnormally low. Along with body temperature, blood pressure measurements are the most commonly measured physiological parameters.
Hypertension is considered to be present when a person's systolic blood pressure is consistently 140 mmHg or greater, and/or their diastolic blood pressure is consistently 90 mmHg or greater.[3] Recently, as of 2003, the Seventh Report of the Joint National Committee on Prevention, Detection, Evaluation, and Treatment of High Blood Pressure[4] has defined blood pressure 120/80 mmHg to 139/89 mmHg as "prehypertension." Prehypertension is not a disease category; rather, it is a designation chosen to identify individuals at high risk of developing hypertension. The Mayo Clinic website specifies blood pressure is "normal if it's below 120/80" but that "some data indicate that 115/75 mm Hg should be the gold standard." In patients with diabetes mellitus or kidney disease studies have shown that blood pressure over 130/80 mmHg should be considered high and warrants further treatment.

Hypertension is labeled resistant if a person鈥檚 blood pressure remains above their target blood pressure despite taking three or more medications to lower it. The American Heart Association released a scientific statement[5] in May 2008 with guidelines for treating resistant hypertension.[6]
I Hope that this does help and remember the magic number 120 over 80. Good luck!!!!!!