Patients risk lives by failing to take drugs

The findings by the British Heart Foundation come as the charity launches a campaign aimed at people with heart problems or those with high cholesterol and high blood pressure who are at higher risk of heart disease by urging them to take their medicine.

Mike Knapton, associate medical director at the charity, said thousands of people in the region could be putting their lives in danger by not taking medicines as prescribed.

“Part of the issue is that people with high cholesterol and high blood pressure often don’t realise there’s a connection between taking their pills and reducing their risk of heart problems,” he said.

“We want to remind people how vital heart medicines are – even if they feel well and don’t have obvious symptoms. And we want them to know they can talk to us if they’ve got questions they can’t ask their doctor.”

The survey showed that nationally nearly a quarter of people with high cholesterol did not realise it increased their risk of heart disease, while more than a third make matters worse by failing to take their cholesterol-lowering medication.

Nearly a third of people with high blood pressure were unaware of the link with heart disease, while more than a quarter on drug treatment said they did not take it as prescribed.

Around three in five people in the region have high cholesterol and around a third have high blood pressure. Both conditions are known as invisible killers because they have no symptoms but slowly damage blood vessels in the heart and make it easier for potentially deadly clots to form causing a heart attack or stroke.

High blood pressure doubles the risk of a heart attack, while it is tripled among those with high cholesterol. Nearly half of heart attacks are blamed on high cholesterol and a fifth on high blood pressure.