Dr. Steve Kopecky

three medicines and your blood pressure is still high you're resistant the number one cause of resistant hypertension is not adhering to your medical therapy it's not taking your pills and i tell people frequently we've done some i think nobel prize winning research here at mayo clinic that shows that we actually swallow the pill it works better than if you don't you know it um it is um

People, you know, they forget, they just quit taking and they think they don't need it because blood pressure is asymptomatic.

If it's a pain pill, believe me, they remember to take it.

Blood pressure is asymptomatic until it's not, which means it's not, meaning you have a stroke, you have a heart attack, or your kidneys start to have trouble and not work right.

So, you know, medicating everybody is not a bad idea.

However,

Wouldn't it even be better if we all had a good lifestyle that we could control the blood pressure with?

And unfortunately, in this country, we don't start to treat these things until you're in a fifth, sixth decade of life.

And by then, you've got your habits so built, it's hard to change the habits effectively.

And the studies have shown it's so much better to prevent a disease from occurring.

That's how 80% of the lives we save in cardiology are by preventing a disease, preventing the blood pressure being high, preventing the arteries being narrowed, rather than wait until it happens and then treat it.

And that's what most people don't really realize.

They think, oh, it's, you know, cardiologists help me because they put a stent in when I have a heart attack.

or they treat my blood pressure when it's high, or they thin my blood when I'm gonna have a stroke.

No, the way we do it is really prevent the disease.

And to be honest, it has nothing to do with willpower.

Willpower is a trait that humans have that is help that's made to help us survive.

And so it has to be changeable, you know, because our willpower.

But our habits are different.

Our habits are what really drive over half of what we do every day, over half of what we eat, what we drink.