Saw my neuro the other day, and he convinced me to go back on one of the drugs that the cardiologist thought might be one of the causes of my problem...after talking to the neuro, I realized I ended up in the ER with problems even AFTER being taken off of this drug. So I'm back on it and hope it helps with some of the symptoms...my neuro does extensive research and clinical trials, and knows the meds and their contraindications, so I am trusting him.

I hope it normalizes, Debbie. Doing some exercises (stretches and leg lifts if you can do them) on the bed might get some blood flowing.

Just had my own bout with this. My BP has always run in the ideal range, but today, I went to my PCP for a normal checkup, and it was 70/50! After several people in the office took it over again, they sent me straight to the hospital to get it checked out. The hospital determined that all my tests looked normal and released me with no explanation.

So who knows why? Nobody said anything about MS causing it, but you have to wonder. If it can affect other autonomic functions, why not this?

Hope your BP regulates soon. Can't say if it's MS related or not though since my family runs on the low side, I actually was concerned before my dx since it was running up in the 140s/80s. Though another thing to keep in mind is that it's not just the top number that means high or low BP. It's really the spread between those numbers. 120/80 is considered normal, the systolic pressure is 120 (contracting), and the diastolic pressure is 80 (resting). A "healthy" BP is when the contracting pressure is 1.5x greater than the resting pressure.

So for someone who exercises a lot, runs marathons and such a BP of say 80/60 is healthy (if my math is right :p) or even 45/30 could be "healthy" for that person and the amount of exercise and training they do. A low BP could also be 120/100, or a high BP of 120/60.

What they're really looking at is how much blood is filling your heart when it's resting, versus how much pressure it is then exerting in sending that blood through your body. If your heart is flooding with blood in rest (diastolic pressure...bottom number) but barely exerting any pressure in contraction (systolic pressure... top number) then it is considered low. Conversely if your systolic pressure seems to be squeezing every last drop of blood from your heart, then your pressure is high.

The 120/80 "rule" is really just an average of what middle-aged American's in fairly good health and shape were running back when they came up with the gauge, sort of like BMI taken from a simple height-weight chart, there are far too many factors to take into account for accuracy, but if the average person wants to check themselves for any potential problems, well there's a highly basic guideline they can look at.

I am not sure what meds you are on, but getting dehydrated while on Altace (Ramipril) can lead to excessively low blood pressure. I had it happen to me while riding the MS150 one year and it took a few days to figure out what was causing it. I still can get vertigo at time when I stand up from bending or squatting and I always know it means I am a bit dehydrated and my BP is low.

My neuro says no, MS and BP aren't correlated. Doesn't make any sense to me that they would be.

i hope you take your BP device with you to the dr. that way you can take the reading when they do and compare for accuracy.

hope the med helps you.

Low Blood pressure
 

Hi

I was diagnosed with PPM in March 2009. Normally (up to about six months ago) I had a blood pressure of about 115/75.

The past few weeks it's been falling to 98/71 and a few days ago I had 95/66. According to a blood pressure chart I have seen, this is "normal", but it causes me even more unsteadiness and borderline faint sometimes. I don't know whether is Vertigo and am about to write to my neurologist about this. My family doctor said that they don't do anything about low blood pressure but I'm wondering whether that is really true.

I wish all of us with low blood pressure, good luck in finding out what to do about this. Low pressure plus unsteadiness (and osteoporosis too) is NOT a good combination.

Cheers
Alexandra Olsson
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