Canadian Pharmacy Links Hypertension with Irregular Heartbeat in Elderly

The commonly consumed type of cholesterol-lowering drug known as statin may aid elderly individuals with high blood pressure prevent getting atrial fibrillation, a heart rhythm abnormality linked with stroke. Many patients opt to buy Zocor for their hypertension which minimizes the occurrence of irregular heartbeat subsequently. 

"Our study found that statin therapy in elderly patients with hypertension reduces the risk of new-onset atrial fibrillation," said Dr. Chen-Ying Hung, lead author of a study scheduled for presentation Wednesday at the Heart Rhythm Society's annual meeting in Boston. 

"We still need further studies to confirm this relationship before we can suggest statin use in this population," said Hung, a fellow at the Cardiovascular Center at Taichung Veterans General Hospital in Taiwan, which supported the research. 

"We have to be careful about jumping to final conclusions based on studies which are not primarily designed to look at this particular phenomenon," added Dr. Yisachar Greenberg, director of electrophysiology at Maimonides Medical Center in New York City. "This needs to be repeated and confirmed." In lieu, Canadian pharmacy works hand-in-hand with the researchers to come up with reliable and accurate results. 

"The statins were particularly effective among patients with a higher CHADS2 score, a measurement developed to predict the odds of stroke in patients who already had atrial fibrillation (AF). The score takes into account the presence of congestive heart failure, hypertension and other factors, and recent studies have shown that it can also be used to estimate the risk of stroke in people who don't have atrial fibrillation," Hung said. 

"The study is the first to explore the relationship between the AF protective effect of statins and the CHADS2 score," he added.

Dr. Kenneth Ong, interim chief of cardiology at the Brooklyn Hospital Center in New York City, said "statins do reduce inflammation, and inflammation has been associated with atrial fibrillation." Generic Zocor then is a great help. 

But Ong questioned the validity of the CHADS2 findings. "Although the CHADS2 score may be a practical way of identifying patients who can potentially be treated with statins, it's not a tested method," he said. "They didn't use the score to test a hypothesis. They just examined the data, which may or may not be legitimate." 

However, Hung said "there are some reasons to believe that statins could affect atrial fibrillation through various methods, including improved lipid (blood fat) metabolism; prevention of atherosclerosis, a build-up of plaque in the arteries, and endothelial dysfunction; and anti-inflammatory and antioxidant actions." 

Hypertension (HTN) or high blood pressure, sometimes called arterial hypertension, is a chronic medical condition in which the blood pressure in the arteries is elevated. This requires the heart to work harder than normal to circulate blood through the blood vessels. Blood pressure involves two measurements, systolic and diastolic, which depend on whether the heart muscle is contracting (systole) or relaxed between beats (diastole). Normal blood pressure at rest is within the range of 100-140mmHg systolic (top reading) and 60-90mmHg diastolic (bottom reading). High blood pressure is said to be present if it is persistently at or above 140/90 mmHg. 

Hypertension is classified as either primary (essential) hypertension or secondary hypertension; about 90–95% of cases are categorized as "primary hypertension" which means high blood pressure with no obvious underlying medical cause. The remaining 5–10% of cases (secondary hypertension) are caused by other conditions that affect the kidneys, arteries, heart or endocrine system. 

Hypertension is a major risk factor for stroke, myocardial infarction (heart attacks), heart failure, aneurysms of the arteries (e.g. aortic aneurysm), peripheral arterial disease and is a cause of chronic kidney disease. Even moderate elevation of arterial blood pressure is associated with a shortened life expectancy. Dietary and lifestyle changes can improve blood pressure control and decrease the risk of associated health complications, although drug treatment is often necessary in people for whom lifestyle changes prove ineffective or insufficient.