can slow pulse cause high BP

I am a 64yr. old man. I have had essential hypertension for about 30 yrs. I take 75 mg. of atenolol and (1)of HCTZ25/lisinopril 20mg per day. I walk approx. 3 mi. per day. My problem is this: at night and in the a.m. my pulse drops into the mid 40s BPM. when this happens my systolic BP goes up into the 180-200 range. When my pulse is in the 50BPM my BP is better and when it is in the 60s BPM my BP is fine. I also have a-fib but have not had an incident of for approx. 3 yrs.  I am in the V.A. health care system and see a nurse practioner. She is very good but not a Dr.

[CCF-M.D.-MJM]

Hi Mike,

This is an interesting question.  BKJ and I were just talking about this and think it is more likely that your medication is wearing off at night and lasting until morning.  It is true that your blood pressure can increase with a delayed beat after a PVC, but is unlikely to be affected by a constant slow heart rate.  

Regardless, a systolic blood pressue in the 180-200 range is too high and should be better controlled.

I hope this helps and good luck!

[I'mallheart]

This is all about the power of the mind over the rhythm of our heart. For instance (according to a study published in the American Journal of Cardiology),if you bring to your mind a positive emotion - the face of your child, a wonderful peaceful landscape, anything that gives you a wonderfulsense of well-being), those encourage cardiac coherence. But as it is a concept and a term that are new to me, I wonder if anyone out there knows something about it and could share it. It seems particularly appropriate to MVPS sufferers who get panic attacks and tachycardia. I am trying to do research on this, because although it is an old idea - experienced meditators can quickly reach a state of "cardiac coherence" . It shows that cardiac rhythm can be influenced by the mind - after some training, and quite a bit of practice - this in theory could apply to us too - So we have in our power, the possibility toinduce a state of balance between the 2 parts of the nervous system: the sympathetic (which is like an accelerator, the part that floods us with adrenaline and goes into overdrive, that is when we have a panic attack) and the parasympathetic (like the brakes, it slows everything down). There are specific techniques (like meditation but not quite, more like biofeedback I guess) to induce this "cardiac coherence" - There exists even a Cardiac Coherence software apparently which guides you through it. I don't know much more, but it seems to me that it is possibly a modernised and westernised re-hash of century-old Eastern traditions, and why not? If it works, and you can do it at home, and it does not hurt anybody else or myself, and if it means dispensing with some medication, great!
But while I am doing my research (not much on the web)I thought that perhaps there is someone (s)? here who might be able to say more, or to explain better, and then those of us who would like to can use those methods to help ourselves and take more of our lives back!
In the meantime (this is the broken record bit) I came across it in the new book by David-Servan-Schreiber, just published in the US, called "The Instinct to Heal: Curing Stress, Anxiety, and Depression without Drugs and Without Talk Therapy" - I was pleasantly shocked to see that the first patient he mentions as someone who benefitted from learning cardiac coherence, called "Marie" who had terrible panic attacks, had... guess what... a prolapsed mitral valve! And yes she did very well with controlling her "panic attacks"! And by the way, I don't have any vested interests in the book, I don't even know the guy!!!I just got interested through some articles abbout this neuro-psychiatrist who was using complementary therapies

[Gaspipe]

Your thoughts are further supported in Dr. John Sarno's book Healing Back Pain ; an excellant resource on the mind body connection.This book has changed my life in several ways and I think a must read for many posters on this forum

[Gaspipe]

Sorry I meant imallheart

[mike o'b]

Thank you for your response. As a follow up, I have started taking atenolol 25mg. in the A.M. and 50mg at bedtime since 1/03/05. My BP continued hgh for about 10 days. Yesterday (1/12/05)it dropped into the 160s in the A.M. and today the same. I will continue to do this and keep you posted. (though I'm not sure how long my original question is going to be listed.)Also about 2 weeks ago i started using a device called Resp@rate which is also supposed to lower BP. The literature says it might take up to 60 days for results.

[Barbarella]

I too read and heard a lot about the "power over mind" issue, and also was in therapy (one of the many)where this technique was exercised/taught.  However, it did not do a thing for me as for controlling my panic attacks, I had it so severe that I developed severe agorophobia.  What helped me was 4 books I read by a Psychologist who dealt with people who suffer from panic attacks, she totally took the fear out of me that I will not die during an attack, and I've been 90% panic attack free for the last 30 yrs.

[~*CaMeO*~]

Who might that Psychologist be? As a long time sufferer of mild/moderate agoraphobia I would be quite interested in reading those books.

I would have no idea if a lower heart rate would "cause" higher blood pressure, but I know (at least in my particular case) that it seems to co-exist.  Lower heart rate = higher blood pressure and higher heart rate = lower blood pressure.  Anyone else noticed this?

[Barbarella]

I don't know if we are allowed to post the names of books etc. but the books were written by Dr. Claire Weeks.  She has died in the meantime, but you can still buy her books at amazon.com or at the malls, if not on the shelf they will order the books.  One of it is called "Hope and Help for your Nerves", the other one is "Peace from Nervous Suffering" the third one is "Agorophobia", and the fourth one is called "More Help for your Nerves".  I read all 4 of them several times.  When I felt a panic attack coming (at home) I got one of her books, and read certain paragraphs again and again.  I also got her tapes.  NOTHING helped me, no biofeedback, therapy, group therapy, medications, yoga, breathing exercises, nothing until I saw an advertisement in a magazine about Dr. Weeks books, the advertisement mentioned exactly what I was going through.  I bought the first book and after reading it could sleep for the very first night in a long time without a panic attack.

[knicks30]

Hey i have heard of that device called RESPeRate. I looked it up on yahoo and found out that it is expensive, almost $300!

Has anyone here actually or know someone who has tried that device? Seems to good to be true.

[mike o'b]

I have gone two weeks now taking 50 mg atenolol at bedtime and my BP is still in the 180s with pulse in 40s BPM. I will continue this practice until 2/2/05 when I have an appointment at the VA. If it does not change I can only conclude that a slow pulse (at least in my case) can cause high BP. I will ask the nurse to cut back on the Atenolol and use another type of BP medicine to control. I've kept a log of my readings. Thaks for your time.

[sweed28]

A related discussion, Slow Pulse was started.