I just want to hear from anyone else who did not have high blood pressure until they begain HRT, and what they did to correct the problem. I am not getting good feedback from my Doctor/RN on this topic and I am concerned.

I entered menopause through emergency surgery a few months ago. Within a few weeks of my surgery I started having hot flashes that interrupted/prevented sleep so I was given the estrogen patch low dose 0.025 mg/day. When I was medically released my doctor gave me 0.075 mg/day because I was still having hot flashes albeit they were milder and I was able to sleep.
I never had high blood pressure, ever. Usually I'm about 120/65 give or take 5pts. After less than a week on the higher dose patch I started feeling dizzy and had 'cotton head' but not the kind that feels like sinuses. So I removed the patch for two days, the symptoms went away, tried it again, they came back. I checked my blood pressure when grocery shopping a day AFTER removing the patch and it was 135/80, I couldn't believe it, the machine must be broken. A week later after second trial with the higher dose patch, used a different BP machine, and got a similarly high reading again.
Called the nurse, don't think she believes me but she did state that my BP was 130/75 at my last doctor visit when I was only on the LOW dose patch !!! I am terrified to think what it might have been just before I decided to remove the higher dose patch.

Does ERT mean high BP? Anyone else had this experience?

Alternatively since I'm not getting good feedback from my current ob/gyn are there doctors who do just 'menopausal' medicine? Is that even a specialty or am I forced to go to a 'baby doctor' when I will never, ever have one?






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Hi Margali,

I went on low dose bcp pills a couple of years ago and they did the same thing to me. After changing pills it went down and wasn't a problem so it could be a different form of hrt would make a difference for you.

I'm not really sure if the hrt and the bcp work the same way but they're all hormones.

Good luck with your search finding a doctor that specializes in meno. I haven't been able to find one in my area and my gyn really doesn't know too much I don't think. It's frustrating to say the least!

Hi Margali..

Welcome to Power Surge. I used to have spikes of high blood pressure readings when I was going through my worst peri symptoms a few years ago. I was an anxiety-riddled mess and figured the anxiety caused the high readings. I also had very normal bp readings at that time so I knew that I had not developed sustained hypertension. I have never been on any kind of HRT. I guess one of my natural hormones were going crazy at that time causing the anxiety which in turn caused the spikes in my bp. It's all a guess with me. The anxiety has settled down and so has my blood pressure.

And good luck finding a doctor that knows about peri and menopausal symptoms. Most think it's only hot flashes. They are soooo undereducated. We have to do our own research on all this.

Well, I did email Pete the Pharmacist with Bellevue about my blood pressure and ERT. He did respond to my inquiry, but basically he said to call in, fill out the form, have the saliva tests done. Which is great, and I will when I am employed and have insurance, I'm not done paying my hospital bill yet, so I'm paying out of pocket for insurance premiums and my bills on my meager savings.

I am grateful for his advice and reply. What aggravates me about the situation is not having a biological explanation for WHY it's happening since it's completely counter to the normal effects of estrogen. More disturbing is not having my nurse be more concerned about the side effects I was experiencing and concerns regarding my blood pressure. The only thing I can come up with, because she's a nice lady and very, very well-educated, is that what I consider to be high blood pressure for me is barely in the treatable range for most patients. My concern about it though is legitimate in that it represented an increase of 15 points for both systolic and diastolic, and this was AFTER removing the patch over 24 hours before, when the side effects were starting to diminish.

I guess I'll have to search for the biology of it on my own, wish me luck,

Still frustrated, Margali