Although nifedipine is suitable for almost all types of hypertension patients, in the population using nifedipine controlled release tablets, about 9.9% of patients will experience lower limb edema. The reason for this is that nifedipine dilates the artery but does not dilate the vein. In this way, although the blood pressure is reduced, blood congestion occurs when passing through the artery-capillary-vein pathway, and excess plasma will enter the tissue gap through the blood vessels, causing edema.
In addition, many patients will feel panic in people taking nifedipine tablets, because the strong antihypertensive effect and greater antihypertensive amplitude of nifedipine tablets make the patient's blood pressure drop rapidly in a short period of time. Patients with hypertension are not very adapted to this physiological change in the early stage of treatment, which will cause an accelerated heart rate reflex, resulting in palpitations .
, as a common drug for treating hypertension, how can we alleviate these adverse reactions of nifedipine?
Although nifedipine can cause adverse reactions, it is not recommended to stop the medication at will
First of all, due to the influence of traditional lifestyle, Chinese residents generally have a large amount of sodium salt intake. A high-salt diet will not only increase the difficulty of blood pressure control, but also weaken the antihypertensive effect of some drugs. Therefore, it is recommended to control the daily sodium salt intake within 5g, while nifedipine lowers blood pressure but is not affected by a high-salt diet. Therefore, long-term use can achieve better antihypertensive effects; secondly, nifedipine is also in the elderly patients with hypertension and . It showed good efficacy, because the elderly often experience arteriosclerosis to varying degrees, which is prone to simple increase in systolic blood pressure, and the action of nifedipine happens to be the arterial blood vessels; again, nifedipine can affect multiple links of atherosclerosis and can delay its progression, so it can reduce cardiovascular lesions while lowering blood pressure; finally, nifedipine does not affect blood sugar. Many hypertensive patients have diabetes , and some antihypertensive drugs will cause abnormal blood sugar or cover up the symptoms of hypoglycemia, but these effects will not occur in nifedipine. For these reasons, the use of nifedipine still has more advantages than disadvantages, so it is not recommended to stop the drug at will.
Since it is not recommended to stop the medicine at will, how can we alleviate the adverse reactions of nifedipine? The combination of
is a good choice, that is, the second drug is added to the basis of nifedipine. Some hypertensive patients have misunderstandings about the combination of medication. First, they believe that only patients with severe conditions need combination of medication, and second, they believe that blood pressure control will become increasingly difficult after combined medication. In fact, hypertension is a progressive disease. As age increases, the difficulty of controlling blood pressure will indeed gradually increase. Therefore, more than half of hypertensive patients need to use combined medication, but the use of combined medication also has its advantages. It can not only achieve better antihypertensive effects, but also reduce adverse reactions to drugs.
nifedipine can be used in combination with sartan or Priligy antihypertensive drugs. Nifedipine itself dilates the artery without dilating the vein. After combining sartan or pril , it can dilate both the artery and the vein, which can reduce edema caused by nifedipine. For panic caused by nifedipine, beta-blockers such as metoprolol and bisoprolol can be combined with drugs such as β-blockers, which are because beta-blockers can slow down the heart rate. The combination of the two can offset the impact of nifedipine on heart rate and thus alleviate panic.
Pay attention to checking the patient's own problems
Of course, patients with hypertensive who take nifedipine may experience edema and palpitations. Patients with hypertension are prone to heart damage. Patients with hypertension may experience left ventricular hypertrophy, and later on, it will progress to left heart failure, which means that the heart has problems with blood pumping function. The heart cannot provide sufficient blood for peripheral organs, which will cause a rapid heart rate reflex, that is, palpitations.
At the same time, blood accumulation in the lungs may cause dyspnea after exercise, and people with right heart failure may experience lower limb edema. At this time, heart color ultrasound , BNP and other examinations can be used to determine whether heart failure is present.
On the other hand, hypertension may also cause arrhythmia , and it can also cause symptoms such as palpitations and palpitations. At this time, an electrocardiogram can be used to clarify it.Note that some arrhythmias are paroxysmal, mainly manifested as intermittent attacks. By the time the hospital undergoes an electrocardiogram, it may have returned to normal. At this time, it can be clarified through the 24-hour dynamic electrocardiogram .
Source: Medical Sciences, Quanscience Garden
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