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For more severe cases the Cleveland Clinic doctors have a growing list of hopeful treatments. And in some victims, at least, malignant hypertension can actually be reversed. For years Dr. Page used kidney extracts, which helped some patients, and pioneered with fever treatments which had similar moderate success. Not until the spring of 1951 was a drug found to control malignant hypertension. This was hydralazine. In quick succession came a series of hexamethonium compounds (followed by the related pentolinium) and more recently reserpine.
From Cleveland Clinic case histories:
A soft-drink manufacturer turning 50 was in bad shape with an enlarged and failing heart, breathlessness, weakness and fluid retention (the old-time "dropsy"). His blood pressure had soared to 230 over 146. He was the first patient given hydralazine at the clinic, and remains one of its best testimonials. In more than five years he has had no signs of heart failure (though the heart is still enlarged), no worsening of kidney trouble, and he does a full day's work.
In the hypertension area, too, diet is hotly debated. "No salt!" cry many doctors, although the link between salt and blood pressure is not fully understood. Many doctors believe that salt content must drop to an infinitesimal one-tenth of a teaspoonful per day. This can be achieved only by an extreme regimen like the famed "rice diet." But even on this, says Dr. Page, a mere 25% of the patients get their blood pressure down to near-normal levels. So: "Whether one wishes the psychic mortification of the rice diet or the dubious gratification of a planned low-salt diet is up to the individual. So many good low-salt diets and foods are now available that it is not necessary to go to the 'rice-house.' A reliable wife is one of the most useful and often essential adjuncts to a strict low-salt diet."
Heal Thyself. In all but work, Page practices the moderation that he preaches. Waking between 5 and 5:30, he makes his own breakfast and starts work at once. With no visitors or telephone calls to interrupt him he gets his best work done (writing and assembling statistics for his reports) before he leaves for the clinic at 8 a.m.
At 150 lbs., Dr. Page is about the ideal weight for his 5 ft. 8 in.—and proud of it. One thing that helps keep him there is his token lunch, such as a bowl of clear soup and a gobbet of cottage cheese doused with ketchup, washed down with skim milk. Much of his exercise comes from running up and down stairs in the seven-floor lab building: it is quicker than waiting for an elevator and is good for the muscles in the leg arteries. In summer, Page plays singles tennis, but is careful to play only one set a day at first, after the winter's inactivity.
He breaks his long workday by getting home as soon after 5 as possible, taking a shower and a nap before dinner. Page and his wife (a former ballet dancer, author of a promising 1953 novel, The Bracelet) have two sons, 13 and 16. At college (Cornell '21), Page used to play "the long-necked banjo" to help pay his tuition. Now he has gone hifi, playing Mahler and Sibelius, while he gets in two or three more hours of medical reading or writing after dinner. Bedtime: 10 or 10:30.