Find answers to your health questions from Cleveland Clinic experts
Q: If you are diagnosed with “pre-diabetes,” can you eat right and exercise enough for it to go away?
A: The diagnosis of pre-diabetes is a risk factor for developing diabetes, not an absolute certainty. So, yes, diet and exercise can normalize blood sugars and reduce your future risk of developing diabetes.
Answered by Kathryn Teng, MD. Dr. Teng is an Associate Staff Physician in the Department of Internal Medicine at Cleveland Clinic. Her specialties are diabetes, high cholesterol, and hypertension.
Q: When I take my blood pressure at home, it’s fine. When I’m in the doctor’s office, it’s always higher. Is this normal?
A: You probably have a condition referred to as "white coat hypertension." This is seen in as much as 15% of the general population. In your case, if you have hypertension and you are taking medications, please make sure that your physician is aware of your home blood pressure readings. If you do not have hypertension, please be aware that the cutoff point for normal home blood pressure readings is an average of <135/85 mmHg. If your average home blood pressure readings are above this number, then you probably do have hypertension and need to be treated.
Answered by Mohammed Rafey, MD. Dr. Rafey is an Associate Staff Member in the Department of Nephrology and Hypertension at the Glickman Urological and Kidney Institute. His specialty interests include hypertension and nephrology.
Q. Is there an increased risk of migraine for women who choose to take estrogen for menopausal symptoms?
A. Yes, possibly. Women with a history of migraine who take estrogen (i.e. birth control pills or hormone therapy) may experience a worsening of their migraine. Headache can be one of the more common side effects from estrogen containing medications.
Answered by Jennifer Poptic, MD. Jennifer Poptic, MD, is a family practitioner, Cleveland Clinic Brunswick Family Health Center.
Q. Does daily exercise prolong the need for knee replacement?
A. Unfortunately, exercise does not prolong the need for knee replacement surgery. Regular exercise, however, does play a very important role in the management of arthritis. Because part of the arthritic process involves the formation of bone spurs and subsequent loss of motion, exercise is imperative to maintaining joint range of motion. Joint replacement surgery can reliably relieve pain, but it cannot reliably restore range of motion. The mantra is that the best determinant of post-operative range of motion is pre-operative range of motion.
Answered by Joseph George Jr., MD. Joseph George Jr., MD, is an orthopaedic surgeon, Lorain Orthopaedics, Cleveland Clinic Lorain Family Health and Surgery Center.
Q. Is it normal for young children to stop taking or needing naps? My 3½-year-old hasn’t taken a nap in quite a while, but seems to do OK.
A. We often read many books as parents, and we hope that our children fall into the molds that are described. This rarely happens. All biological phenomena (normal height, normal weight, normal blood pressure, etc.) are best described as ranges of normal rather that any one particular number.
There are many normal people who are short sleepers, just as there some people who are long sleepers. We recognize them, just as you do your child, by the fact that they seem to behave normally when they get their quota of sleep. I would not consider your child abnormal and would also let you know that there are some first graders who still need a nap.
Answered by Jyoti Krishna, MD. Jyoti Krishna, MD, D-ABSM, is Head of the Pediatric Sleep at the Sleep Disorders Center at Cleveland Clinic.
