hi Nigel,
I guess you know that you should avoid grapefruit/juice, when taking BP tablets, grapefruit can cause a sudden drop in BP which will make you feel dreadful.
Yes, it's the Felodipine which is grapefruit sensitive, the doctor warned of it, the pharmacist warned of it, and the packaging warned of it as well!
As I never eat grapefruit, or drink grapefruit juice, it's not a problem.
grapefruit and blood pressure drugs - Google Search
Thru balancing my diet and exercise I have managed to reduce my BP tablet intake from 5 tablets a day to just 2, Bisoprolol 5mg and Amlodipine 10mg.
I've improved my diet somewhat, and I'm taking more exercise in the form of country walks - I've bought a handheld GPS (Garmin Dakota 10) which I use to monitor distance and speed, plus now I've managed to download free maps to it, to actually find the more obscure footpaths.
I'm lucky in that I back on to open fields, that there are lots of local footpaths, and I'm close to the 'Five Pits Trail', a trail made from the old raoilway lines joining five of the old pits round here.
BP is now 135/78 and resting pulse 60, thats been the same for about 4 years, which isn't bad for a guy is touching 78 years, my BP used to be 180/88
That's pretty good Eric, at least mine's heading the right way
I was 55 a week and a half ago.
If you can get your cholesterol down to about 4.5, your BP will also come down, I use Benecol products that contain Plant Sterols, yogurts and maragarine.
Also there are lots of 'natural' foods that help to get BP down.
The doctors seemed happy with my blood samples, they have never mentioned 'cholesterol' at all, just said that my blood results were OK - and cholesterol was one of the tests ticked on the form - they took three tubes of blood originally, and subsequently just one (for urea and electrolytes - apparently to do with the Ramipril).