Do You Have White Coat Syndrome?
July 29th, 2008 by admin
You have probably experienced this before, going to the doctor and they go to get the cuff to take your blood pressure and you feel your heart pounding. This is white coat syndrome or blood pressure that rises in response to the anxiety of visiting the doctor. The problem with this syndrome is that reading may be seen as your normal reading. You may find that using a device that measures your blood pressure for 24 hours throughout the day to give an accurate reading. Or you can take multiple readings and take note of them to bring them to your doctor.
how do I learn to control white coat syndrome? just the thought of having my blood pressure taken makes it rise dramaticallyi. I am afraid to go to the dr. because they want to put me on medicine and I won’t take it.It really is a serious problem with me.I monitor it at home but some drs. still want to go by their readings.I need an alternative to get over this problem. after the loss of my brother and mother i suffered severe anxiety and started taking st. johns wort and it helped the anxiety and blood pressure.But if a person approaches me for my blood pressure it goes up and what is funny I can usually feel it going up and can tell you what it is.It feels like a surge in my chest.
Hi Carol,
Good question. There are actually a couple of things you can do.
First, do keep good records of your ‘at home’ monitoring so you can bring it in to the doctor and show him what your normal readings are. You might also want to bring your blood pressure monitor in to the doctor as well so he can use it to verify that your monitor is accurate. That should help relieve some of his anxiety.
Second, taking your blood pressure at home regularly is a great thing to do. It does help lower your blood pressure and it also helps desensitize you to having your blood pressure taken. Beyond this, you can begin to imagine that your doctor is taking your blood
pressure which begins to desensitize you to the doctor’s presence. You can also practice by having family and friend’s take your blood pressure until you are comfortable having somebody else take your blood pressure.
Third, practicing a method of slow, deep, regular abdominal breathing helps to lower and stabalize your blood pressure. You can employ this method for the 20 minutes or so that you have before you see the doctor and while you are waiting. Learning how to do this technique well at home before you see the doctor will give you some immediate control when you see the doctor. You can learn more about this technique here:
http://www.lifematters.com/resperate.asp
Thanks for asking,
John