My blood pressure has been low for month

71/44 with light-headedness when you stand is not a "wait and recheck" situation — please get seen by a clinician today, and call your local emergency number right now if any of the red-flag signs below are present.

Why: a top number in the low 70s with symptoms on standing is low enough that home watching is not the safer choice. I can't tell from here why the pressure has been low for months — dehydration, medication, hormone or heart-rhythm problems, or something else all look the same on a home cuff, and only a clinician can separate them. This is not advice to start, stop, or adjust any medicine.

If you are being seen today — the door is the appointment, and until you are seen:

• Sit or lie down rather than standing, and get up in stages: roll to the side, sit on the edge of the bed for a count, then stand. No stairs alone, no standing in the shower, no carrying anything heavy.
• Keep taking your own medicines at their usual times unless a prescriber has told you otherwise. Do not add a tablet, split a tablet, hold a dose, or add salt tablets or supplements on the basis of one home reading — that decision belongs with the prescriber or pharmacist.
• Small, regular sips of water and normal meals are fine support. Electrolyte drinks are not a treatment for a months-long pattern, and more is not better — do not try to fix a reading in one sitting.
• Keep someone in the house or on the phone. Do not drive yourself, and do not go out alone to the clinic if standing is what makes you light-headed.

Avoid tonight — extra or borrowed blood-pressure tablets, "energy" or adrenal-type supplements, mystery powders, anything bought online without a prescription, alcohol, hot baths, and salty snacks used as a home fix. Also avoid standing up quickly from bed, and avoid deciding that because the number is low, your medicines are the problem — write it down for the clinician instead.

Red flags — stop home care and call your local emergency number now:

• Fainting, or nearly fainting again, or you cannot stay standing safely
• New confusion, difficulty focusing, slurred speech, or one-sided weakness or numbness
• Chest pain, breathlessness when resting, or a fast or irregular heartbeat with the dizziness
• Skin cold, clammy or greyish; repeated vomiting or diarrhoea; black or tarry stools
• Passing very little urine, or feeling severely weak and thirsty at once
• Any of these, and you should say "my blood pressure is 71 over 44 and I feel faint on standing" — the number plus the symptom is what the crew needs.

Decision tree

1. Any red flag above, or you cannot get to a clinician today? → local emergency number now, lie down, do not drive yourself.
2. No red flags, but you have standing light-headedness and a reading this low? → booked clinician visit today, with someone staying with you until then.
3. A clinician has you and the plan is in place? → follow the prescriber's plan and the cuff log; the home monitor stays a record, not a decision-maker.

What to bring / say (screenshot this): a written log of date, time, arm, sitting or lying, the readings and the symptom at that moment; every medicine and supplement in the house, including anything bought without a prescription, with the last dose time; allergies; any blood pressure, hormone or water tablets; and the question you most want answered — "what number or symptom should bring us straight back?"

In the next 24 hours, success looks like this, not a cure: a clinician has assessed you; the readings and symptoms are in writing rather than in memory; you have not fainted or fallen; and someone knows what to watch for tonight.

One question that changes tonight's care: are you currently taking any blood-pressure, water tablet, heart, or steroid medicine — and when was the last dose?