Study Suggests Blood Pressure Meds May Reduce Risk of Dementia (cnn.com) 29
CNN reports:
Knowing you have higher than normal blood pressure — and taking medications daily to treat it — may be one key to avoiding dementia in later life, a new study found.
Scientists already know that having high blood pressure, particularly between ages 40 and 65, increases the risk of developing dementia in later life, said study coauthor Ruth Peters, an associate professor at the University of New South Wales in Australia, via email. But she added that research has been less clear on whether lowering blood pressure in older adults would reduce that risk. "What is so exciting about our study is that the data shows that those people who were taking the blood pressure lowering medication had a lower risk of a dementia diagnosis than those taking a matching placebo," said Peters, who is also a senior research scientist at Neuroscience Research Australia, a nonprofit research organization....
The study, published this week in the European Heart Journal, combined data from five large randomized, double-blinded clinical trials of more than 28,000 older adults with an average age of 69 from 20 countries. All had a history of hypertension. Each of the clinical trials compared people taking blood pressure medications with people taking a matching placebo pill and followed them for an average of 4.3 years.
Pooling the data, Peters and her team found that a drop of about 10 mm/Hg on the systolic and 4 mm/Hg on the diastolic blood pressure readings at 12 months significantly lowered the risk of a dementia diagnosis. In addition, there was a broad linear relationship: As blood pressure dropped, so did cognitive risk, which held true until at least 100 mm/Hg systolic and 70 mm/Hg diastolic, the study said. There was also no sign that blood pressure medications may harm blood flow into the brain at later ages.
Scientists already know that having high blood pressure, particularly between ages 40 and 65, increases the risk of developing dementia in later life, said study coauthor Ruth Peters, an associate professor at the University of New South Wales in Australia, via email. But she added that research has been less clear on whether lowering blood pressure in older adults would reduce that risk. "What is so exciting about our study is that the data shows that those people who were taking the blood pressure lowering medication had a lower risk of a dementia diagnosis than those taking a matching placebo," said Peters, who is also a senior research scientist at Neuroscience Research Australia, a nonprofit research organization....
The study, published this week in the European Heart Journal, combined data from five large randomized, double-blinded clinical trials of more than 28,000 older adults with an average age of 69 from 20 countries. All had a history of hypertension. Each of the clinical trials compared people taking blood pressure medications with people taking a matching placebo pill and followed them for an average of 4.3 years.
Pooling the data, Peters and her team found that a drop of about 10 mm/Hg on the systolic and 4 mm/Hg on the diastolic blood pressure readings at 12 months significantly lowered the risk of a dementia diagnosis. In addition, there was a broad linear relationship: As blood pressure dropped, so did cognitive risk, which held true until at least 100 mm/Hg systolic and 70 mm/Hg diastolic, the study said. There was also no sign that blood pressure medications may harm blood flow into the brain at later ages.
uups (Score:2)
Re:uups = What? (Score:2)
Not the greatest of FPs. Were you in a hurry? My only link is to the "correlation" thing...
It's a complicated topic that deserves substantive discussion. There is lots of evidence that high blood pressure is harmful in various ways, but we still lack enough data to know what is going on.
Therefore in solution terms, I'd like to see a good continuous blood pressure monitor, one that is wearable and without any pressure cuff. There are several approaches that I've researched, but I haven't found any products i
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If it could be done without a pressure cuff, I imagine it would rely on ultrasound sensing of vessel contraction/dilation. Seems doable but maybe not just yet.
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I think other approaches might use timing information of individual pulses or blood velocity. Perhaps sampled at separate locations and taking body position into account? I studied some of the math involved, and it's pretty complicated. The length of the channels the blood flows in does not change, but the size does fluctuate slightly, and in a nonlinear way. Someone in this discussion mentioned a blood medication that works by affecting the elasticity of the arteries. (My interest in the topic goes way bac
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Don't some of the really advanced smart watches continually monitor BP? Or is that just pulse?
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The only ones I've seen use air pressure to periodically inflate a pressure pad. At least that's how they seem to work, but I admit that I didn't look too closely.
Re: uups (Score:2)
Re: uups (Score:2)
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Yep, my BP goes up as soon as they strap that cuff on. I can feel it. When i did a physical for life insurance they checked it 4 times during the interview. Each time it was lower than previous. They call it white coat syndrome.
Same thing happens to me. My blood pressure soars super high at the doctor's office. But it's only slightly elevated when I check it at home. They were sure my home testing was wrong and put me on a higher BP meds. I started passing out every few days. Totally sucked!!! They put me back on my regular dose and said I must have white coat syndrome.
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Same thing happens to me. My blood pressure soars super high at the doctor's office.
I close my eyes and concentrate on slowing my breathing, relaxing, etc.. I think of sitting on a beach, hearing the waves. It helps.
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Re: uups (Score:3)
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Damn, those they creatures are just nasty. If you ever find out who they are, please let us know.
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Yes, those things are great, and everybody should do them. But even super-fit Olympic legends like Michael Johnson can be taken by surprise and have an unexpected stroke.
Johnson now takes aspirin, a statin, a blood-thinner and a drug to keep his blood pressure in healthy range.
https://www.theguardian.com/li... [theguardian.com]
I unknowingly had dangerously high blood pressure and went to see the doctor about my headaches. He was trying to get a reading and saying "this can't be right". 30 minutes later I was in hospital. The tablets got me back to safe levels, controlling my diet and getting daily exercise has my BP normal again.
Re:uups (Score:5, Interesting)
Look at aspirin. For years it was recommended that everyone take a low dose everyday for general health. But then the effect on digestive health appears to be much more dramatic than we thought. So it became a balance if aspirin was indicated, which for most people it is not.
Typical omissions (Score:5, Informative)
As usual, the lay media summaries leave out critical information. Does anyone have a link to the actual paper since I don't want to pay past the paywall for it?
Which specific drugs are they talking about? Do they consider that unimportant?
I am currently on Amlodopine and Valsartan (I had an allergic reaction to Lisinopril). These different meds are not the same and they don't do the same things to you. There are other drugs as well.
Depending on what the data actually shows -- this may not be any sort of health boon as presented. Details matter. Side effects matter. And that is what is always so frustrating with these types of articles. They leave that out in favor of a "clear" message which is wrong more often than not.
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Clearly you are not past 60. When you do, you'll be inhaling them.
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I get that a lot. You work for my cardiologist, right?
Re: Typical omissions (Score:2)
Wow, how was this done ethically? (Score:2)
I'm assuming it conforms to ethical standards, but I didn't know you could go this far in modern times. HBP is known to be linked to so many negative outcomes, I almost have to wonder if anybody who agreed to take a chance on getting the placebo already had early stage dementia.
BP meds can have harmful side effects (Score:4, Informative)
https://www.health.harvard.edu... [harvard.edu]
Scott Adams says BP meds made him suicidal [investmentwatchblog.com].
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https://www.health.harvard.edu... [harvard.edu]
That doesn't have anything to do with side effects of BP meds. The recalled Pfizer batch had an excess of nitrosamines during manufacture. This is happens with many drugs and foods.
https://www.fda.gov/drugs/drug... [fda.gov].
Nitrosamines are known to most of us slashdot readers because they're the component of bacon that can cause an increased risk of cancer.
A trade-off calculation that's an easy choice for slashdot readers.
It might also be (Score:2)
...that people who need that drug don't get old enough to get demented.
09 repost? (Score:2)
is dementia caused by too many bad memories?
https://science.slashdot.org/s... [slashdot.org]
https://www.npr.org/templates/... [npr.org]
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a link from the comments in the above slashdot article https://web.archive.org/web/20... [archive.org]