Raena Morgan: Hello, I’m Hello, I’m Raena Morgan, with iHealthTube, visiting with Robert Kowalski. The author of the Blood Pressure Cure and we’ve been talking about the drugs that are typically prescribed for hypertension and some of the side effects, which you spell out in your book. Sometimes people don’t take their medication because of the side effects, could you address that doc?, with iHealthTube, visiting with Robert Kowalski. The author of the Blood Pressure Cure and we’ve been talking about the drugs that are typically prescribed for hypertension and some of the side effects, which you spell out in your book. Sometimes people don’t take their medication because of the side effects, could you address that Bob? Robert Kowalski: It’s more than sometimes. Raena Morgan: Oh, it’s more than sometimes? Robert Kowalski: It is the biggest thorn in the size of physicians that regardless of the kind of drug unless it’s something that’s being used for an acute problem. Acute problem means that its going to have a span of a couple of weeks, a urinary tract infection, a flu, whatever it might be you go to the pharmacy and get the drug take it for two weeks. Its gone and that’s the end of that. People are very willing to take that sort of drug, but when it comes down to having to go to the pharmacy, every single month to refill it and taking that pill every single day for the rest of their lives and dealing with the potential side effects, that’s when you start having problems. Multiply that when in the case of blood pressure, it’s likely that one drug won’t do the trick because any single drug will give you about a 10 point reduction. So doctors combine 2, 3, 4 drugs at the same time, while encouraging you still to cutback on this, that and the other thing. So, studies have been made of the some of the most pressing issues in medicine and way up on top is what they refer to as patient compliance that whether the patients really take the drugs that the doctor is prescribing. Raena Morgan: Well, it sounds so overwhelming. Robert Kowalski: It is indeed. Very recently this year 2007, there was a study published that of all the drugs that doctors prescribed, the category of drug that has the worst compliance as the say, “Patients just don’t take the drugs that doctors are prescribing”. That class of drugs is for blood pressure, the so called, antihypertensives and the reasons are multifold as we discussed these drugs are rifed with side effect anywhere between, fatigue, loss of energy, dizziness, chronic cough, headache in the morning, and— Raena Morgan: Frequent urination? Robert Kowalski: Frequent urination to the point that its beyond just a nuisance, I mean its truly lifestyle inhibiting and for guys especially the loss of sexual function. And on top of it, bear in mind that blood pressure elevations have no symptoms. Raena Morgan: That’s right. Robert Kowalski: There is no way to tell because you’ve been under stress and you can develop a headache, that doesn’t mean that your blood pressure has gone up. It simply means you’ve got a tension headache from literally the physical tension that your body is going through. No symptoms whatsoever. So someone comes in to the office, the doctor makes the determination that he or she has hypertension, puts that patient onto a medication and from having no symptoms whatsoever, suddenly they’re having these adverse effects and they think to themselves, "You know I felt perfectly fine before I started taking these drugs and I feel terrible now. So, I’m going to stop taking them.” And when they do, number one, there are some drugs that you can't just top taking because that can literally kill you. Raena Morgan: Right. Robert Kowalski: You can literally cause death by abrupt cessation of a drug and the very least, you are not controlling the blood pressure and a lot of the patients who stop taking these drugs simply do not tell the physician that they’ve done so. Raena Morgan: Well, that sounds