Hello, Thank you for asking at HCM. I care fully read your question and understand your concern. You are right on being concerned of ears when you have to fly while you have blocked nose or the common cold. The ears can be very tender due to not balanced pressures in both sides of the eardrum. On the other hand it is true that pesudoephedrine can cause hypertesion crises especially taken orally. What I would recommend is: 1. You can take nasal drops with decongestants- this causes the effect in the nose and does not effect the hole body, decreasing a lot the risks for hypertension crises- it is safer. 2. Make sure you drink well so your secretions are not so dry and are easy to clean 3. Saline solution, nose lavage is very recommended to have several times a day to clean your nose mucusa 4. One dose of Loratadine at night might reduce the swelling of the nose and is safe to use- it might give mild sleepiness. 5. Make sure you chew on something while flying. This will help with the balance in the ears 6. You can have lozenges, strong minth or eucaliptus taste to help reduce nose congestion. 7. It is not recommended to have forceful nose secretion clearing but just easy not traumatic ones and use the saline solution as explained above to have better nose secretion clearing. I hope this helps and answers to your question. Best regards, Dr Antoneta