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A new scan to detect and cure the commonest cause of high blood pressure

qmul.ac.uk

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Re: A new scan to detect and cure the commonest cause of high blood pressure

#51

Post by aantix »

aantix wrote: post #47
secondcoming wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And what happened? Did your blood pressure return to normal? Did the years of medication have any permanent side effects?

I still take one BP medication - 40mg of Lisinopril. My blood pressure numbers are much more "normal" - usually around 135/85. I seem to be caffeine sensitive in general. On days where I drink caffeine, my BP is ~15 points higher on the systolic side. It lasts the entire day. I may be a slow metabolizer. I've had a ton of anxiety over the years that seems to have vanished with the adrenalectomy. I was always on edge…

Yes, lots of palpitations. To the point where I wore a monitor for a few days so that my cardiologist could evaluate.

With hyperaldosteronism, because your body retains elevated levels of sodium, it dumps potassium. The low potassiums is probably the main cause of the palpitations.

Low potassium is a marker for hyperaldosteronism.

Re: A new scan to detect and cure the commonest cause of high blood pressure

#52

Post by DougMerritt »

fareed79 wrote: post #37

This is not a CT but a PET scan, it records passive radiation from a molecule injected into the body, and therefore a 10 min long scan. Then it is based on radioactive carbon (C-11), which is pretty uncommon and needs quick use after production, so not every PET(CT) can do that, it needs be in the vicinity of a production facility (i.e. close to a university/research hospital). This is the sense of the last sentence:…

Right, but it's a weird terminology subject, because CT is just short for "Computerized Tomography", with the initial implied "X-ray" part being a convention -- but all of these 3D scan techniques are variant kinds of Tomography, with X-ray CT/CAT scans being the original kind.

Your comments about C-11 are well-taken and an important caveat.

Re: A new scan to detect and cure the commonest cause of high blood pressure

#53

Post by gedy »

aantix wrote: post #41

I had my left adrenal gland taken out in September. TL;DR - If you know someone that takes a lot of blood pressure medications and has for many years, have them see an endocrinologist and get them screened for hyperaldosteronism ( aka Conn's syndrome ). Kind of a crazy story. I've had blood pressure (BP) issues since my senior year of high school. 1996. Started taking my first medication then. Since then, I've had on…

Thanks for this, I should probably get these screens as well after reading this. My BP can shoot to the moon very easily and always seemed related to my adrenalin.

Re: A new scan to detect and cure the commonest cause of high blood pressure

#54

Post by snvzz »

tootie wrote: post #42
harveywi wrote: post #7

For those who may not have access to this treatment, an alternative is to add the following to /etc/hosts: 127.0.0.1 facebook.com 127.0.0.1 www.facebook.com 127.0.0.1 twitter.com 127.0.0.1 www.twitter.com

Bad joke. Social media can not cause chronic hypertension. It's physiological.

I guess you've never seen the streams of pictures of unhealthy food.

Re: A new scan to detect and cure the commonest cause of high blood pressure

#55

Post by dr_dshiv »

lol768 wrote: post #10
dr_dshiv wrote: post #2

I hope they make a lot of money. That’s a pretty fantastic system.

The work was funded by the NIHR (i.e. the UK taxpayer); the primary purpose is patient benefit to users of the NHS, not profit. If they're making a disproportionate "lot of money", there should be a signed revenue-sharing agreement in place given the benefit of the public funds provided.

I figure—but what, the doctors that developed this just take home NHS salary? It is going to save the NHS billions.

HBP costs over 100 billion $ in the US. https://www.cdc.gov/policy/polaris/healthtopics/highbloodpre....

Re: A new scan to detect and cure the commonest cause of high blood pressure

#56

Post by kris_wayton »

fareed79 wrote: post #37

This is not a CT but a PET scan, it records passive radiation from a molecule injected into the body, and therefore a 10 min long scan. Then it is based on radioactive carbon (C-11), which is pretty uncommon and needs quick use after production, so not every PET(CT) can do that, it needs be in the vicinity of a production facility (i.e. close to a university/research hospital). This is the sense of the last sentence:…

That's interesting, thanks for sharing. I was aware of the more common "radioactive glucose" PET scan that helps pinpoint cancer...where fast reproducing cells consume glucose. Didn't know there were adjacent types of PET scans.

Re: A new scan to detect and cure the commonest cause of high blood pressure

#58

Post by skyyler »

ManuelKiessling wrote: post #57

I really hope that stuff like “the commonest” doesn’t become one of the most common mistakes in HN headlines…

I'm confused, do you have issue with the word "commonest"?

The American Heritage dictionary gives the positive, comparative, and superlative forms as common, commoner, and commonest.

What's the mistake?

Re: A new scan to detect and cure the commonest cause of high blood pressure

#59

Post by someweirdperson »

ManuelKiessling wrote: post #57

I really hope that stuff like “the commonest” doesn’t become one of the most common mistakes in HN headlines…

It's a verbatim copy of the original article, published by the Queen Mary University of London.
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