Has anyone dropped Diovan and done alright?

[frank619]

I stopped taking Pravachol a few weeks ago after reading all the horror stories about it on the web and in the recent stories on statins. I haven't told my doctor yet, but I know what he is going to say anyway. At this point, I don't even care. But I have not read anything really bad about Diovan's side effects--which I am also taking. I just hate medicine I guess. Part of the problem is that I have changed almost all my eating habits to healthier ones and exercised regularly for 3 years now and I am still about the same with the medicine. I am about 20 pounds overweight but I can't seem to lose weight no matter how much I run and cut my calories and fat intake. My blood pressure is about 124/87 but I do not want to be on any medicine permanently. All my doctors seem to be medicine obssessed. They don't seem to understand that not all of us want to be prisoners to them. Any suggestions out there? Has anyone just dumped all of this stuff and done alright without them? I am starting to think that I can't trust any doctors out there...

[Moxie75]

Originally Posted by frank619

I stopped taking Pravachol a few weeks ago after reading all the horror stories about it on the web and in the recent stories on statins. I haven't told my doctor yet, but I know what he is going to say anyway. At this point, I don't even care. But I have not read anything really bad about Diovan's side effects--which I am also taking. I just hate medicine I guess. Part of the problem is that I have changed almost all my eating habits to healthier ones and exercised regularly for 3 years now and I am still about the same with the medicine. I am about 20 pounds overweight but I can't seem to lose weight no matter how much I run and cut my calories and fat intake. My blood pressure is about 124/87 but I do not want to be on any medicine permanently. All my doctors seem to be medicine obssessed. They don't seem to understand that not all of us want to be prisoners to them. Any suggestions out there? Has anyone just dumped all of this stuff and done alright without them? I am starting to think that I can't trust any doctors out there...

Frank,

you sound exactly me and alot of other people on this board. I have tried many times to drop it all in fact I am doing that right now but did not want to let my fellow board members know until I have results after 2 weeks of doing this.

The other day I accidentally took 2 diovan and I did this 2 times in the course of a week. I am an athlete and eat healthy and cannot drop these 2 sizes that I have gained from being on diovan. I have upped my cardio from 5 miles to 8-10 miles a week. I also weight train 5-6 days a week.

My husband keeps insisting that I do not have have high BP and that I have white coat and that I should not take any of their meds. I decided to try this again and see if he is right. I have been monitoring my BP now for the last 2 days without meds and it is normal and even low normal (118/75) but I think the true test will be after 2 weeks as the meds stay with you for about that long. I am the real life guinea pig on this board as many can attest to I have tried so many things. I will keep everyone posted as to my results but I beleive like you that you should try every single thing you can think of before accepting the meds and the crap that goes with it..Good Luck, Lisa

[jtu91952]

Frank, good luck in trying to get of the meds. My cardio gave me a script for pravigard(pravachol & asprin) but i won't take it. She finally gave me a script for niaspan, but im afraid to take that also. Alot of these bp meds can cause other diseases, so you're right to be concerned.

Some on this board use diovan without side effects. I've not personally tried diovan, but i've tried ace inh., arbs, beta blocker and ccbs. I've even tried diuretics. Some caused me great problems w/ horrendous side effects and other caused no side effects and no reduction in bp.

If you discover a way to lower your bp w/o meds, please post it on this board. Good luck!

[mrmojo]

frank - are you on straight diovan or is it combined with a diuretic?

I gained a lot of weight on benicar with hctz, a lot of it has come off since i quit taking it

my mother is on diovan with hctz & she gained weight but there are a lot of other problems in her case

from some of the discusions here it seems like the hctz can cause weight gain in a lot of people

[iRC aDiKz]

Originally Posted by frank619

I stopped taking Pravachol a few weeks ago after reading all the horror stories about it on the web and in the recent stories on statins. I haven't told my doctor yet, but I know what he is going to say anyway. At this point, I don't even care. But I have not read anything really bad about Diovan's side effects--which I am also taking. I just hate medicine I guess. Part of the problem is that I have changed almost all my eating habits to healthier ones and exercised regularly for 3 years now and I am still about the same with the medicine. I am about 20 pounds overweight but I can't seem to lose weight no matter how much I run and cut my calories and fat intake. My blood pressure is about 124/87 but I do not want to be on any medicine permanently. All my doctors seem to be medicine obssessed. They don't seem to understand that not all of us want to be prisoners to them. Any suggestions out there? Has anyone just dumped all of this stuff and done alright without them? I am starting to think that I can't trust any doctors out there...

I stopped taking diovan last year (Oct. 2004) and im doing fine,i dont know why, may be because of the exercise and the water therapy, my blood pressure is 124/84 without the medicine, i hate medicines, the only medicine im taking now is the gliphizide for my diabetes, my blood sugar is normal too, 84, the highest is 140, without diovan im doing great, sometimes my blood sugar is 115/74 i dont know if that is low or normal, sometimes it is 105/75. Just exercise everyday i work-out from 4:00am to 7:00am.