Question about heart medication

[GentleOtter]

I wonder if anyone can advise me with regard to the medication dh has been given post heart attack in early May, please?

He is on:
Bisoprolol fumarate 5mg
Rampiril 5mg
Clopidogrel 75mg (until the end of July)
aspirin 150mg
Atorvastatin 80mg

His normal resting BP is usually around 70/55 but is 120/80 although this can fluctuate to slightly below.

My concern is that he is becoming quite mentally confused, very tired and very isolated from us. (He is not depressed). His body thermostat seems to have gone into overdrive too and he feels warm when the rest of us feel cold.

He has spoken to different G.P's but they seem to feel that 'these things happen' and have not explained why.

My question is, is this normal on this cocktail of medication?

I am very worried.

Don't really think this is about a statin debate.
The missing word from ur post us can!!!
Aspirin can cause stomach ulcers but not always.
And for what it's worth, I wasn't suggesting that you got the information on the net but that u were giving out a bias version of what u knew on the net.

Statins like all other drugs have known POTENTIAL effects. These are taken into consideration by the prescriber to ensure a balance between risk and benefit.

Statins CAN but certainly DON'T ALWAYS cause muscle damage and there benefit post mi and stroke should not b underestimated

J Am Coll Cardiol. 2007 Jun 12;49(23):2231-7.
This is the most up to date literature review on q10
If you read this article it demonstrates that there is insufficient evidence to show q10 makes a difference and that's it's effect may even be placebo
Hope that helps clarify my point that advice should b take with a pinch of salt unless uv seen the evidence urself

Coming from somebody who habitually uses textspeak on an internet forum

Internet forum via a mobile interface
I'll admit my flaws. Shame you had to stoop to that level.
Didn't mean to offend you, but you need to be careful about how you give advice on a forum like this.
What if someone reads that, thinks they are doing more harm to their heart than good and stops cause their gp won't prescribe Q10?
High cholesterol continues to be high and they suffer another (potentially) preventable vascular event in 6 months!

Thanks for the text speak etiquette lesson, I'll take ur points on board and I hope u consider mine

Yy to pimsoclock. You cant go round on a forum giving specific drug advice. You dont know the patient, cant see them and dont know the full history. Also uk has very different system to us.

All you.can do safely is.point them in the right direction

Monday and I am on the case, waiting for departments to open.

His diet is excellent and I think it contains a good dose of Q10 naturally - lots of fish, spinach, avocado, low chol. game etc. He sort of rattles when he walks with all the tablets he is on and I would be hesitant to add to the cocktail but his diet should suffice.

I have made a list of the changes we have noticed plus some that he mentioned last night; cramps, steatorrhea, constantly blurred vision, profuse sweating and tiredness being the main ones.

Optician appointment booked for later this week.
Letter to heart nurse written and I drive to town to hand deliver plus an email copy.

Good luck, hope things go OK. Remember, its their job to reassure you, don't leave untill you've got a plan you are satisfied with.

Let us know how you get on.

Perhaps give some consideration to getting in touch with the British HEart foundation? They may be able to put you in touch with better support in your area

x

Yes, I will phone them today, PIMS.

There is not very much info in the rehab waiting room as it doubles up with the breathing difficulty group so more info on that than useful recipes or support groups.

What also shocked me was the size of the rehab group- it is very large indeed. So many people of all shapes, ages and sizes having mi's in this area.

Incidentally, there is an ongoing issue regarding ambulance cover here. There is poor coverage and bitterness over ambulance numbers so they are trying to introduce 'First Medics' in 4x4's. I will look into volunteering for that.

Thinking of you GentleOtter - so glad posters like Pimsoclock have come along with advice .
Hard enough to have these health issues with DH ,without the rural complications .
Not good is it - wonder how they manage in huge countries like USA ,Australia where remotness must be common .
Sorry idle musing ,you need all your strength to deal with matters in front of you .
Don't forget to look after yourself .

A quick update - we both saw a different GP today and she wanted to refer dh to the other GP who specialises in heart matters except we cannot see him until 26th July.

We also asked to be referred to a counsellor but again, huge waiting list.

It appears that the beta blocker may be the culprit and will need looking at but the consensus seems to be that the tablets do the job they are supposed to do and you have to live with the side effects.

The good news is that dh's chol. is now 2.6.

An earlier post suggests a reading of less than 2.6 for high risk patients.

dh's reading was 6.1 on the day of the mi so the statins and diet have dropped the level considerably.

I would have thought lower was healthier than higher?

Gentleotter, I can't give medical advice as I am not a medical person nor am I as eloquent as some of the other posters

I can tell you that I have survived 3 MI's. I also have stents.

I am also on the drugs your husband is on except except I am on losartan not Rampiril ( I take others too).

I totally understand the depression , tiredness, blurred vision and the foggyness. I also get too hot when everyone else is cold and I get cramps. Some of these are side effects from the drugs, others because my heart is damaged.

Counselling was another important tool for helping me - I had to push for it though and was lucky enough to get it through work and then had some more recently via my GP.

BHF are also fabulous and can help.

I call my beta blocker tablet (Bisoprolol) my "fuck it" tablets because that's how they make me feel. I don't care about things that previously would have had me venting in rage. They do cause foggyness and sometimes my brain just seems to stop working. Although not ideal, I prefer it to the rage I sometime feel. I have asthma and my GP took me off them, I had to beg my cardiologist to go back on them as the benefits far outweigh the negatives

Apologies fo rthe long post

Oh Tigerbomb

I only have a small insight into how you must feel from seeing how my dh feels.
It is such an abrupt life changer and in an instant all previous priorities, worries, everything suddenly takes a lesser place to your health.

The cocktail of meds, especially that type of beta blocker make the world a weirder place to be in for dh on top of the weirdness of having an mi but they are helping to heal the damage. He found he was suddenly locked in this strange place yet unable to talk about it. I can only imagine how bewildering that can feel for anyone in that situation.

This evening, the little one fell asleep early (yay) so we have spent a long time going over all the things he found hard to discuss.
Strangely, our conversation was stopped by a phone call from the heart specialist GP at 9pm. He has been referred to a cardiologist who can help tweak the meds to ones which may help his mental state a bit better plus the offer of counselling.

I feel as if we have progressed tonight and the world looks less bleak. dh feels quite optimistic and has shared some of the secret burdens which were weighing him down but which I can cope with.

The advice and reassurance here has helped more than anyone would know and by pushing a bit, we have made a start in a good direction.

That's good news. It's good that he has opened up and even better that the call came at such a good time. Hopefully things will move forwards now and he will get the help that he needs

As he will be taking aspirin long term, it would help if he had the gastro resitant ones or has Lansoprazole as it really helps with the acid indigestion or heart burn that he will no doubt get.

Good job you are in Scotland with the free prescriptions, I was paying a fortune until I learnt about the pre-payment prescription, but that's another thread

Counselling helped me so much because at first I was in denial. I had to learn to open up and talk to poeple around me. I was so scared about everything. I was too scared to tell my DH things as I felt he had enough on his plate without having the extra burden of things that were worrying me.

I found that my head was just as important as my heart and it took me a while to realise that things weren't going back to the way they were before

The cardiologist, Cardiology nurses and the GP were a great help as the first 6 - 12 months were the worst time for me. Medication was tweaked and fiddled with until they found the right cocktail. Lifestyle changes had to be made, and acceptance of those adjustments were difficult. Every single twinge in my chest secretly become an "Is this it?" thought. All thoughts that I found difficult to share with my DH . The tiredness and fuzzyness of the drugs certainly didnt help

MI's are a huge life changer and not just for the individual sufferer. My whole family has changed. We sometime talk about things as in before the MI's and after the Mi's. I was 42 when I had my MI and I am 45 now and part of me feels that it was the best thing to have ever happened to me because I changed. As you said above worries, priorities, they all change. The only thing that matters is you and your family.

I wish you and your DH all the best Gentleotter and I hope he gets sorted soon. If you ever want to talk then I am only a pm away

[unmumsnetty Hugs - but I don't care]

Gentle otter, I'm delighted to read ur latest post. As I said before there is a lot of scope for meds to b altered, his ramapril can go up to allow his b blocker to come down and he won't need to stay on that dose of atorvastatin forever!
Good luck, hope the consultant gives you some encouragement and stay in touch
xxxxxxxxxxx

Gentleotter - your DH really needs to get to Dundee and see a consultant cardiologist.

DH is cardio and there is nothing in the world that riles him more than GPs tweaking post-angioplasty medication, when they know fark all about it.