Too Many Blood Pressure Pills—Here’s A Time When Treatments Go Too Far

You’re in the hospital with an acute illness. Perhaps your gallbladder is acting up, doubling you over with abdominal pain. While taking care of you and your gallbladder, the doctors noticed that your blood pressure is elevated. So they adjust your blood pressure medicines to bring it back down to normal. Everything seems hunky-dory.

 

But if you don’t get close and careful follow-up, those blood pressure pills could do more harm than good.

 

In a recent post, I showed how common it is for patients to receive antibiotics in the hospital even when those drugs will do more harm than good. Well here’s another harmful practice: adding new hypertension medications to patients whose blood pressures jump up during hospital stays.

 

To read the rest of this article, please visit Forbes.

PeterUbel