My mother in law has high blood pressure and has stopped taking her pills as she feels no different. Help!

She has stopped taking the pills since before christmas as she doesn't feel any different and doesn't want her life ruled by monthly visits to the docs for another prescription or having to go for monthly blood tests. I have told her to at least inform her GP, but she says they haven't noticed her not going for the scripts so why should she tell them. I don't want to scare her but I don't know what possible effects this can have on her health and I would like to see her around for a lot more years. how do I get her to go back to the docs and take her pills like she should. Any help is gratefully received.

Your mother in law needs to continue with her medical treatment. As much as regular trips to the GP and taking tablets in annoying, she has to weigh up the pros and con in this situation, if your gran does not take her BP medication she is at serious risk from heart attacks, strokes etc which is far worse than the annoyance of taking her tablets/going to the GP.
You cannot force someone to seek medical help, they have to realise this themselves. Try again gently explaining to her, don't tell her off or she'll likely just become more defensive regarding the whole situation.
Depending on your mother in law GP's attitude, you could try giving her a call, for patient confidentiality reasons the GP won't discuss your mother in law's medical history with you, but you can inform your GP what is going on..I'm sure her GP might be aware if no repeat prescriptions are being re submitted? Maybe her GP could do a home visit etc

High blood pressure has more long term affects than short term.
It can be the cause of dementia - which results in a great deal of sadness, not only for the affected but also for the whole family and can result in many other serious problems including kidney failure, blindness etc.
You must stress on her that this will not only affect her, but her family and friends in the long term. She should also be aware that she may be invalidating any insurances that she may have on her life by not ensuring that personal care is taken.

You have to scare her.... the reason you take blood pressure tablets are
not because your blood pressure makes you feel ill on a particular day or a particular week but if it's up consistently for months and years your risks of heart attack,stroke,heart failure ,kidney failure are massively increased, so if she doesn't want to take them that's her decision but she has to know the risks and decide for herself..hopefully she will see her GP discuss these...good luck!

You must get her to take her medication as her blood pressure will only get higher, some times a person needs to try more than one tablet to find out which one suits her and start to lower her blood pressure. My doctor tried three other tablets before Lisinoprol which worked a treat my BP is now 106 / 70. There are short term effects to very high BP and that is a stroke

i can understand her views. one thing the doctor told me taking the high blood pressure medicine is like buying insurance, if you decided to pull out of it, something happen its gonna to be drastic. this is because if she doesn't take the medicine her pressure may go too high and beyond control and damage her organs and lead to other chronic illness. i would suggest you search the net for what i said, print and show to her. the doctor told me its a life long consumption of the medicine. as for monthly visit to doctor i think it can be reduce to every 3 mths. this can be discussed with the doc.

Your mother-in-law has the age-old belief that if she can't feel any difference then medication is "obviously" not helping. This also happens a lot with people who have mental health issues such as schizophrenia...they begin to feel well and then stop taking their meds which of course brings back the symptoms that brought them to need meds in the first place. A doctor is not going to notice that she is not getting her meds refilled...that doesn't mean that she is not in any danger.
Find some credible info on the dangers of untreated high blood pressure...is there a Dummies book cause that would be fantastic for her...and leave them around. If you preach to her she will push back but if the info is lying around she may sneak a peek when there is no one around...hope this helps...

In-laws eh! Old folk won't be told! Anyway to answer your question, you don't necessarily have any symptoms before being diagnosed with high blood pressure (or while on medication), it usually shows up during routine check-ups. however once diagnosed, although it can take a while to find a medication that is suitable for you, it is essential to keep taking them. Once you stop, the likelihood of something major like a stroke, heart attack, kidney damage, circulation etc is greatly increased. In fact high blood pressure is extremely dangerous if not treated and the body cannot take the strain of having to deal with it for too long (maybe only 2 years!) before something gives. Your mother in law, even though doesn't want regular trips to see the GP (who does), needs to think about other things too, like what happens in the event of her becoming seriously ill, who will look after her and to be honest if she does become ill, she will more trips to the docs and more and more pills to control not only the high blood pressure but whatever else has been damaged by it! So try and persuade her to see the GP to discuss options as the alternative is more than outweighed by a minor inconvenience of a monthly trip or the odd blood test. She must be special for you to be concerned, not many people care about their in-laws, lol!