question for you... this is really bugging me .

Nurses General Nursing

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OK... this may sound wierd, but I've been meaning to ask some of you wise folk out here, and I keep forgetting. But it just happened again, and I got up out of bed to post this.

For the past couple weeks, when I first lie down to go to sleep, I keep hearing a bruit in my ears !!! Really loud and rushing... like my carotids swooshing in my ears. And it's really starting to bug me. I can't remember ever hearing that in the past. ???

Any thoughts? Both ears... either side. Will wane after a period of time.. or maybe I just fall asleep and don't hear it anymore.. can't say. Never hear it when I'm upright, though. ??? :confused:

Thanx for any input... will TRY to get some sleep now... ("swooosh, swooosh, swooosh").... :stone

Specializes in midwifery, ophthalmics, general practice.

hey Jnette............just a thought.. remember that if your stressed and drinking lots of coffee (which I'm told americans do all the time!! hows that for a streotype!) the caffeine will push your BP up very nicely. it pushes mine up from 80/50 to 110/70!!

I know you were messin'...............!

Karen

Specializes in Hemodialysis, Home Health.
hey Jnette............just a thought.. remember that if your stressed and drinking lots of coffee (which I'm told americans do all the time!! hows that for a streotype!) the caffeine will push your BP up very nicely. it pushes mine up from 80/50 to 110/70!!

I know you were messin'...............!

Karen

I'm a coffee drinker, Karen... perhaps 3-4 cups a day. 2 in the morning, 2 in the evening or after work. But coffee has NEVER affected my BP in the past !(as in the past 30 years).

I mean, if I didn't drink a little coffee, I'd probably have NO B/P at all ! :chuckle

And no... I'm not a "stresser"... never have been. Am on no meds of any kind, either. Ah well.

Jnette,

With the increase in BP, a visit to your GP is in order. Because your BP is elevated, I doubt the problem is similar to mine but I have been in remission from pseudo tumour cerebri for about three and a half years now. I had the "whooshing" for two years and ignored it. As the ICP increased with the progression of PTC, my brain shifted forward, all of the glands in my neck and brain became compressed, and my optic nerves were bent. My left eye (the GOOD one) went from being mildly far sighted, to ridiculously near-sighted overnight. The headaches were beyond intense. And the wooshing went from happening when I went to bed, to happening all of the time. It really did sound like a helicopter landing on my head and would cause a lot of disorientation. Nearly getting hit by a car in a crosswalk wasn't enough for me... I had to wait until I nearly fell down the stairs with my baby in my arms. Then, I saw my optometrist. When I called to make the appointment and described my symptoms, he wanted to see me immediately. When I arrived, he gave me heck for driving myself. CT scan and MRI ruled out anything else. With PTC, your ICP is off of the charts and causes the intense wooshing. While I do not think this is your problem (my BP stayed at my baseline throughout all of this - 110/70), I wanted to point out this "orphan illness" because the incidence is very much on the rise and the "wooshing" is the predominant symptom. Do not ignore the problem, please. Whatever is happening with you is likely unrelated to PTC, but in my case, waiting resulted in the loss of a lot of peripheral vision - I was one of the lucky ones, I gained it back but only after two and a half years of 1000 mg of Diamox a day (terrible side effects). If I had seen the optometrist sooner, I would never have lost that peripheral vision to start with. Some wait too long to see a GP or optometrist, or the symptoms worsen too rapidly, and they go blind because of the damage to the optic nerves.

Don't mean to hijack your subject - just trying to educate a little about this illness because it is not very well known (when I came back from seeing several specialists with my diagnosis, I had to explain it to my GP, he had never heard of it and didn't have a clue). But, please Jnette, do not wait to have this checked out... see your GP.

Specializes in Hemodialysis, Home Health.

Wow, Lydia ! What a frightening experience for you. I'm so glad you finally had it looked into and that everything turned around in the end.

I, too, have never heard of PTC... interesting, if not scary. Gee.

No, I seriously doubt it's anything like that, or that it's anything serious at all, for that matter... but thank you for the education on this.. sure haven't heard anything on that before !

Like I said, I'm going to keep an eye on it for a week or two and get a baseline of pressures and symptoms, then go see my NP and have her take it from there. The upper abdominal pulsating is something I just remembered, too, ... have noticed it a lot when I lie down, but just paid no attention to it other than "huh"? Now I wonder if it's all part of the same "whatever" is going on.

Thanx again. :)

Specializes in ER.

Pulsation in your abd.....abdominal aneurysm....get thee to a physician.

For Pete's sake, you've impressed a bunch of hardened nurses already, what are you waiting for? More symptoms?

Stop talking to us and go to the doc, we all want to know what it is too!

This reminds me so much of my community clinical experience the other day. I took this ladies BP in the caffeteria of a local grocery store and it was 210/110. I thought to myself, I am a student and maybe I heard it wrong, so I had my instructor double check me. It was accurate, we phoned her doc and they told her to get to the E.D. STAT. She said she has been having blurred vision and god love her she made an eye appt. Sorry to get off topic, just thought I'd share my experience.

Pounding pulse and hearing it when trying to go to sleep was one of the first symptoms I had of Graves' Disease.

Good MORNING !

I'm still ALIVE !!! happy05.gif

Thanx, everbody, for your input. Just got up and checked my "resting pressure" which usually first thing in the am would be REALLY low for me... well...it's 132/94. :angryfire

I realize that's not a majorly elevated BP, and as mjlrn says, she's happy to have hers that "low" (wow, mjlrn... you take the cake !)... but for me, this is HIGH. I mean, I've just NEVER had hypertention, and this has just come on over maybe the past month... why all of a sudden? I think that's what bothers me more than the BP itself. Now that I think about it, I've also noticed hearing my heartbeat quite loud in my chest when I lie down... and often my upper abdomen pulsates as well (like a few inches above my belly button). I can actually feel it with my hand.. "boing, boing, boing"!

Heck, I didn't even have this when I was preparing for my big clinincals and the NCLEX ! I did have one episode of SVT, where I nearly passed out at work ... didn't know why, just got dizzy. NM took my BP and HR.. BP was ok, but HR was 180 ! Had the echo and treadmill test done at that time, wore a holter for a week at work (how embarrasing)... but everything was ok, and it never occurred again. That was at my only high stress time, right before my CPNE and graduationover a year ago.

I'm currently not under any stress at ALL, nor am I one to stress over things... I'm one of those "ignorantly happy" ones... :rolleyes: So I don't get it.

Family hx. ? Mom just started getting hypertensive in her 70's... she's now 83 and does have to struggle to keep hers down. But she's the worrying kind, and very excitable.. opposite of me. Dad (as far as I know) never had HTN.. he passed away 25 years ago from Lymphoma... (my entire family has been cancer ridden on both sides). Sister's BP is like mine... always quite low. But she has the SVT thing going on regularly ....

So I don't know. Bummers. Guess I'll check my pressures several x a day for the next week or two and write them down so I'll have something to take with me when I go get myself checked out. I have a wonderful NP whom I trust explicitly and have been seeing for years. She always laughs at how "healthy" I am. Just have never been the "sickly" kind.. guess after spending nearly the first 18 mos. of my life in the hospital, I got all my sickness behind me then ! :chuckle

Karen, sorry for being melodramatic... I was really just playing ! Heck, I could be on my death bed and I'd still be silly !

Caffine addict... loved the "going to bed" smilie with the little eyes peering around in the dark... heh heh....that's really how I felt!

Well, thanx again, all ! I'll keep on top of this.

Ok everyone has been all nice and considerate and I don't want to freak you out but Abdominal aortic anuerysm is very serious and very dangerous and if you can feel a pulsing in your abdomen you need to be seen by a good doctor very very very soon if for no other reason than to rule out AAA, they are 90% fatal because the symptoms are generally very mild like unoticed HTN, if the anuerysm bursts death occurs in a matter of minutes.

Specializes in Hemodialysis, Home Health.

OK.. I hear you loud and clear. Calling now for an appointment. I'm off tomorrow, too, so hopefully she can see me .

Not snibbling or weaseling here, but would there be ANY other reason to feel that abdominal pulasating? As in digestive system wotking, or something?

And would it come and go.. different times of the day, or night... and somedays, even many, not at all? Or would it have to be CONSTANTLY noticable. ?

I just hate going to the doc for what might turn out to be nothing... just hate that. I'm just not one to run to the doc all the time for every little thing.

But I do respect all of you enough to know that your advice is sound... so I shall call and make an appt.

Gosh... sure didn't mean to upset or worry you guys. :imbar

When I've had particularly busy days at work, (when you can't even stop long enough to get a drink of water, or go to the bathroom), I have had that same symptom of hearing my heart beat, or 'swoosh' when I would lay down to go to sleep. Over time I realized I was becoming dehydrated @ work. I wouldn't have breakfast. Had 1 glass of tea or water for lunch, and sometimes that was it for the day, until I got home @ 9 or 10 o'clock at night. I realized that I had gone approximately 24 hrs with just 1 glass of water! I started buying bottles of water to take to work. I drink those each day I work, in addition to what I drink for lunch. The heartbeat, or 'swooshing' has stopped.

Goodluck jnette. Let us know what your NP finds.

Specializes in Hemodialysis, Home Health.

OK. I have an appointment for Thursday afternoon.

Thanx for the "push" I needed. I'll be pissed if it's nothing... then again, I'll be relieved if it's nothing. :chuckle :rolleyes: Sheeesh.

ok. i have an appointment for thursday afternoon.

thanx for the "push" i needed. i'll be pissed if it's nothing... then again, i'll be relieved if it's nothing. :chuckle :rolleyes: sheeesh.

yeahi feel much better now!!!

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