Deep Breathing and Blood pressure

User avatar
Mick F
Spambuster
Posts: 56359
Joined: 7 Jan 2007, 11:24am
Location: Tamar Valley, Cornwall

Re: Deep Breathing and Blood pressure

Post by Mick F »

softlips wrote:The peak blood pressure isn't that relevant it's more the increased risk of persistently elevated pressure that's the issue.

Persistently elevated pressure.

Yep.
That's the problem.

How do we check for that then?

I was given one of those 24hr devices that took my BP every half-hour.
It was terrible in the extreme. They told me to carry on my normal life normally and do what I normally do.
I went for a bike ride ...............................
The thing nearly blew a fuse. :lol: :lol:
I couldn't sleep as it woke me up every half hour.
I was stressed and tense, and utterly wound up for the whole of the 24 hours.
The figures were sky high and completely pointless ................ and I told them so.

Knowing what I know now, I'd have told them to stick their device somewhere unmentionable.

Blood pressure measuring?
I care not a jot any more, because any measurement can't be a true figure of normal or persistent.
Mick F. Cornwall
User avatar
531colin
Posts: 16083
Joined: 4 Dec 2009, 6:56pm
Location: North Yorkshire

Re: Deep Breathing and Blood pressure

Post by 531colin »

softlips wrote:
Mick F wrote:
softlips wrote:There are clear guidlines on measuring blood pressure ...................
Utterly agree, but which figure is significant?

Give it some time and get nice and relaxed, an take and average (or whatever) and pick the best number out of the bunch.

Is that right?
Is that a good thing?

Should we not be looking at the highest most stressful figure?
If you're going to have a heart attack or a stroke, it won't be when you're relaxed, but when the figure is high.


The highest incidence of heart attacks occur early in the morning just before or after getting out of bed. The peak blood pressure isn't that relevant it's more the increased risk of persistently elevated pressure that's the issue.


And its the same with stroke?
Isn't that because of diurnal rhythm which means that blood pressure peaks about that time?....(blood noradrenaline levels, or some such?)

Referring to my earlier post....
531colin wrote:Ever simultaneously felt the pulse in (somebody else's) wrist and ankle?
The ankle pulse is only fractionally behind the wrist pulse, and that's not because your blood squirts along at 100 miles an hour, its because the "pulse" is a pressure wave that propagates throughout the arterial tree......its not a slug of blood rushing past.
The shape and amplitude of the wave is governed by the stiffness/elasticity of the arterial wall at the point you are looking at.....so the amplitude of the wave can be greater at (say) the ankle than the aorta.
Its nothing whatever to do with the size of the hole, although its contraction of arterial smooth muscle that makes the wall stiffer.
This is all physics......"peripheral resistance" increasing blood pressure is a lazy pseudo-explanation that medics (physiologists, etc) are taught early in their training, and they have to un-learn it if they ever want to really understand how your body works.
Wouldn't it be good if you could increase the pressure in your hydraulic brakes just by tapering the tube?


The heart (left ventricle) ejects into the elastic reservoir of the aortic arch. This is a low-energy way of starting the pulse pressure wave on its journey down the arterial tree. If the patient's blood pressure is persistently raised, this puts an unsustainable load on the heart pumping against a raised diastolic pressure. The patient is likely to have a heart attack (ie. workload of the heart muscle exceeds the available oxygen reaching the muscle, so ischaemia) OR a stroke just at the point of peak blood pressure.

Whatever you are measuring, you need some sort of baseline.
Measuring chainline on a bicycle, we all measure from the midline of the frame.....it doesn't work if I suddenly decide to measure chainline from the edge of the bottom bracket shell.

With blood pressure, any fule kno that stress, exercise, or a bucketload of other things can push your pressure UP.
That's why we choose to look at RESTING blood pressure for a baseline......you can't somehow "over" rest and get a spuriously low figure.

Any cyclist pushing on up a hill will have high heart rate and blood pressure, that would be considered "dangerous" if a patient presented with those readings at rest......but we all know that people who take regular exercise, and regularly get out of breath and push up their pulse rate and BP have much greater exercise tolerance, and also tend to be healthier into old age, than your average couch potato.
User avatar
Mick F
Spambuster
Posts: 56359
Joined: 7 Jan 2007, 11:24am
Location: Tamar Valley, Cornwall

Re: Deep Breathing and Blood pressure

Post by Mick F »

531colin wrote:That's why we choose to look at RESTING blood pressure for a baseline.......
That's the hard part for me at least.
They'd need to give me a general anaesthetic for someone to get a good resting BP reading.

Wouldn't it be good if you could take your BP without having the awfully tight strap round your arm. Something as easy as like taking your pulse.
Mick F. Cornwall
Post Reply