Speaker: Monitoring blood pressure.
Dr. Lee: One of the very important things for reducing your heart risks in the type 2 diabetes is reducing the blood pressure and I think in the same way you know your weight, you should always know what your blood pressure is as well.
Dr. Duggan: Blood pressure is going to be a prime focus of any physician visit; so it's important that the patients knows what target blood pressure they need to reach. They are going to be on medication most likely for their blood pressure.
Dr. Lee: Sometimes you may need two, three sometimes even four medications before you can get your blood pressure down to the appropriate level.
Fred: The doctor is there to help you, medication is there to help and you must strive to reach those targets for a better life.
Dr. Lee: Itβs worth working your weight until you can get it safe. Write it down somewhere and make sure you know what it is; check with your doctor each time you go in.
Dr. McPeak: Now when you come to see the doctor in the office, it's naturally an uncomfortable environment and there will be elevations of the blood pressure which may not be reflective of what's going on in your real world that's so called weight white coat hypertension. So it's very important that you do purchase a home blood pressure monitor and take multiple readings at various times throughout the day, record them, bring them in and your physician will review them with you.
Speaker: Blood pressure maybe measured at your home with an automated home blood pressure cuff in your doctor's office or by a procedure known as 24 hour Ambulatory Blood Pressure Monitoring. You will notice that blood pressure is expressed as systolic/diastolic measured in millimeters of mercury (mmHg). Systolic values reflect your pressure during the heart contractions, diastolic values reflect the resting tone of your circulatory system between heartbeats. As a person with diabetes your systolic blood pressure should average less than 130 mmHg and your diastolic blood pressure should average less than 80 mmHg.
Dr. Lee: Safe blood pressure for somebody with type 2 diabetes is regarded as lower than what somebody without diabetes perhaps may have. So do talk to your doctor about that.
Speaker: This will minimize your risk for developing heart attack, stroke and kidney failure. If these objectives are not met with diet, exercise and weight control, your physician may recommend medication.
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