Who knew? I still don't understand how a blood pressure machine works. I remember going to the doctors growing up and there it is on the wall, the old manual variety. You place the cuff around your bicep, close a valve, then blow it up well above where your higher reading will be. This is where the magic happens, usually the nurse would take her stethoscope and listen to your heart for a few seconds and figure out what the pressure is as air is being released from the cuff around your arm. Seems a bit subjective to me, but I'm not a medical professional. Nowadays, the same thing is done with these big wheeled carts with an array of cuff choices and fancy buttons to keep track of everyone a doctor might see in a year, or probably more. I was told I would need to buy my own blood pressure monitor machine and since I am in a do or die situation, with cancer it's not like I can say "nah, I'm a pass on this, Doc." Doctor says you need so and so, you say "yes sir/Ma'am and hope the request won't be in the thousands.
I honestly had no idea, I was thinking I would be investing in something about the size of an old DVD player, it would need to be plugged into the wall and I would have to go to a medical supply store. Nope. Nowadays, you can order a defibrillator for the house, if you want from Amazon. While driving home from the doctor visit on Thursday, Wife had already looked them up and had some pre-chosen for me. I just told her to pick the one with the biggest cuff she could find and with overnight delivery. This fancy new contraption cost me a whole $59.99. I mean things are just getting cheaper and more convenient by the year. This little box is about the size of a can of Spam and runs on 4 AAA batteries. I think everyone should have one and should be checking their blood pressure every once in a while, you never know. I wouldn't feel this way a week ago when I thought these things were only for medical professionals to understand, but this one does all the work for you, you just sit there and get the data about 30 seconds after pressing a button.
I am kind of glad there is a little delay on receiving the chemo drugs, it allows me to create a bit of a history or baseline of my blood pressure on this particular machine. So far I have read my pressure three times, twice after waking up and once when I got home from work. They have all been pretty much around 141/79 with a heartbeat below 70. The perfect reading is closer to 120/80, but I think I'm ok, considering I weigh 400 lbs. The upper end for the clinical study where I get the meds for free is 150/90. This is supposed to be because this medicine is known to increase the blood pressure, which is why this has become topic number 1 all of a sudden. At this point, I have shown to have good readings, the doctor even prescribed me blood pressure medicine for when I start taking the chemo drug and my blood pressure does start going up, I have something to counter the effects. I guess we can get this show on the road here starting this week.
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