Under Pressure

Journal

Find out what the author has in common——unfortunately——with one of the greatest quarterbacks in NFL history

THERE'S A MESSAGE on my phone from Joe Montana’s publicist. Legendary quarterbacks with four Super Bowl rings don’t often dial me out of the blue. I excitedly return the call. It turns out Montana has written a book. He’s going to be in San Diego to promote it. I can have 20 minutes with the icon who, with three Dallas Cowboys circling his wagon, tossed “The Catch” to Dwight Clark to win the 1981 NFC championship game. No way would I pass on this opportunity.

I arrive in the lobby of the Manchester Grand Hyatt. One of his two publicists escorts me up to Montana’s two-room suite. I sit in the outer room and glance at a copy of his book: Joe Montana’s Family Playbook for Managing High Blood Pressure. Coauthored by cardiologist James Rippe, the book opens with Montana’s own 2002 diagnosis of hypertension.

What’s this? Joe Cool has more than just ice in his veins? Could all those fourth-quarter comebacks have worn out his ticker?

Here’s the double irony. Days before getting the call from Montana’s people, I’m in my doctor’s office. The meniscus in my knee is in worse shape than the mortgage market. I need my primary-care physician to allow me to see a specialist (you know the healthcare dance). Routinely, the doctor takes my blood pressure. Zoom——the top number hits 175. Joe Montana can tell you —— that’s a wicked awesome quarterback rating, but a scary blood-pressure score. The doctor asks two nurses to independently check my pressure. When they each report numbers in the 170s, the small knot in my stomach cinches a little tighter.

I walk down the hall to get an electrocardiogram. An EKG measures the electrical activity of your heartbeat. Lying on a table with wires taped to my extremities, I wonder: How can this scenario not make my blood pressure rise? This is like taking your car to get the tires rotated and coming back later to find the engine scattered around the service station.

The EKG results indicate I’ve still got a few more miles left in me. But I’m rattled. And when Joe Montana’s rep rings me right after this happened, it feels like a concocted coincidence——like a really cruel punking by Ashton Kutcher.

WHEN MONTANA and Dr. Rippe walk out from the back room of the suite, I stand and shake their hands. Rippe is talkative. Montana almost seems shy. The man who won a championship at Notre Dame and four for the San Francisco 49ers is tallish——6-foot-2——but not looming. And his hair has grayed considerably (one more cheerless attribute we share).

An icebreaker: Any fond memories of playing the Chargers back in the day?

“No, but we played them all the time,” says Montana. “We usually played the Chargers in the preseason, too, and I remember the hard dirt during the [crossover from] baseball season. I wasn’t sure whose field was worse at that time . . . actually, I guess ours was worse.”

Despite a family history of high blood pressure, Montana says he was shocked and surprised his had gotten so high.

“My wife made me go in for a physical,” he says. “I had no symptoms. I felt perfectly fine and was literally going through the motions to get out of there. I don’t remember what my blood pressure was, but it was more than 140 over 90. I was sent to a cardiologist, and they found a small blockage getting into an artery. Nothing is real serious at this point in time, but it’s something to keep an eye on.”

Montana used to love overusing the salt shaker and snacking on greasy foods. Now, he says no to the 20-ounce porterhouse and eats much smaller portions at mealtime.

“I’ll get chicken on top of a salad,” he says. “Or pan-seared tuna. I never would have thought I could have lived on that before. I never would have thought to order that before.”

As a professional athlete, Montana had believed he couldn’t be sacked by something as unseen and unsuspected as hypertension. But as Rippe points out, it can strike anybody, any time. It’s estimated 72 million Americans have high blood pressure. Two-thirds of these people don’t have it under control, and a third don’t know they have hypertension. According to Rippe, better diagnosis and treatment could save 250,000 lives a year.

“We want to get two ideas out,” says Rippe. “We want to motivate people to get their blood pressure taken. And we want to educate people. We want to get the information out about even the subtle ways you can decrease blood pressure.”

HIGH BLOOD PRESSURE is referred to as a silent disease. There’s no way to know it’s high unless you check it. Medical guidelines say healthy blood pressure is 120/80. The 120 is the systolic number. It represents the pressure of blood flow as the heart beats and pushes it through the body. The second number is the diastolic number. This is a measure of the pressure between heartbeats, as the heart rests and fills with blood.

There are lifestyle changes that can help regulate blood pressure. A doctor will tell you to watch your diet and exercise. If you have really high BP, a physician might prescribe medicine. Rippe notes, however, there are unknown factors——in part, genetic——that account for why some people develop hypertension.

I’m not going to pretend meeting Joe Montana turned my lifestyle around. I do, however, applaud his decision to go public with his condition and work to educate others (even if his free book is funded by the makers of Lotrel, a hypertension medication).

Since my scare in the doctor’s office, though, I’ve tried to do right at the dinner table and in the gym. My 175 was a temporary spike. Lately, I’m regularly in the 130s. My doctor has me on beta blockers, a pill I take daily. And look for me in Rite Aid, sitting in the pharmacy area using their blood pressure monitoring device.

“Don’t stop paying attention to it,” says Rippe. “The first medicine Joe was using was giving him side effects and wasn’t lowering his pressure. So he switched to a combination of medicines. But importantly, he kept paying attention to this.”

I can be hardheaded, but I don’t need further coaching. I realize a heart attack could be the only notice you get when your BP is out of bounds. Call this game plan conservative, but getting your heart sacked seems more of a downer than eating less tailgate fare and getting your arm squeezed now and then in Rite Aid. I’m ready for life’s second half. And hope to be——like Montana——available for overtime.

(For more information, call 877-438-2736 or go to getbpdown.com.)

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