Good Sleep Can Prevent And Manage High Blood Pressure
Most people experience a dip in blood pressure during the deepest stage of sleep , which is the body’s normal and healthy reaction to sleep. Not having that nighttime dip is a risk factor for heart disease and may increase daytime blood pressure.
Typically people spend 90 minutes to two hours in slow wave sleep per night. A recent study published in Hypertension found that men who got less slow wave sleep each night were a higher risk for hypertension than men who got more deep sleep.
While sleep disorders, like sleep apnea, and age can both affect the amount of deep sleep you get, there are steps you can take to ensure a good night’s sleep. Getting seven to eight hours of sleep a night, maintaining a consistent sleep schedule and being more active during the day can help improve the quality of your sleep.
Spikes In Blood Pressure Don’t Always Need Er Care
Most cases of ‘hypertensive urgency’ can be treated safely in doctor’s office, large study finds
HealthDay Reporter
MONDAY, June 13, 2016 — If your blood pressure reading at a routine doctor’s office visit is alarmingly high, in most cases that doesn’t mean a trip to the emergency room, a new study suggests.
In the Cleveland Clinic study of office visits by almost 60,000 patients with “hypertensive urgency” , less than 1 percent needed a referral to a hospital ER.
The rest were treated and then sent home with no added risk in terms of patient outcomes, the researchers said.
“Hypertensive urgency is common in the outpatient setting,” noted the team led by the clinic’s Dr. Krishna Patel. However, the researchers believe that “most patients probably can be safely treated in the outpatient setting, because cardiovascular complications are rare in the short term.”
Dr. Suzanne Steinbaum, who directs Women’s Heart Health at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York City, called the finding “reassuring.”
“For those patients with hypertension, an episode of elevated blood pressure can be alarming,” she said.
However, the Cleveland study suggests that “hypertensive urgency — defined as a blood pressure of at least 180/110 — without symptoms or evidence of end organ damage can be managed safely as an outpatient,” Steinbaum said.
The findings are published online June 13 in JAMA Internal Medicine.
But it’s been unclear whether the best course of action is to send such patients to the ER.
Blood Pressure Measurement Errors
First, its important to make sure that your blood pressure really is fluctuating. If youve made the measurements yourself using home monitoring equipment or the machines commonly found in grocery stores and pharmacies, the changes youve seen might actually be related to errors or variations in the measurement process itself.
While home blood pressure monitoring can be an effective and useful tool in some situations, you need proper training to ensure you’re using the correct technique, as performing the measurements without this training might explain the variation you see.
Drugstore machinesthe kind that requires you to sit in a chair and put your arm through a cuffare notorious for being poorly calibrated and fairly inaccurate.
To prevent erroneous reads, it is best to bring your home blood pressure monitor to your next healthcare provider’s appointment to be sure you’re using it correctly, and also bring the home readings to compare them with the readings in your healthcare provider’s office.
Alternatively, some healthcare providers recommend ambulatory blood pressure monitoring in which a device is worn by a person at home. The devices measure the blood pressure over a one- to two-day period every 15 to 20 minutes during the day and every 30 to 60 minutes at night.
This is more costly and not always available, however, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services recently approved national coverage for this non-invasive diagnostic test.
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High Blood Pressure May Cause Anxiety
Whether or not high blood pressure directly causes anxiety is less clear. More often than not, anxiety causes high blood pressure first, which causes the person to worry about their blood pressure and ultimately experience more anxiety.
It’s possible that high blood pressure does cause anxiety, but most likely the anxiety is a response to the high blood pressure experience, or to concerns over a person’s health. Most people can’t feel their blood pressure because high blood pressure on its own doesn’t cause any symptoms. But some of the other causes of high blood pressure may cause a person to feel more anxiety.
So You Have High Blood Pressure What Else Could Be Wrong
If you have high blood pressure, get checked for diabetes and high cholesterol. Most people who have high blood pressure also have some of the other risks for heart disease and stroke, such as not getting enough physical activity, having unhealthy eating habits, smoking, being overweight or drinking too much alcohol. Ask your doctor to test your kidney function through a blood and urine test, and through the electrolytes in your blood kidney problems can cause high blood pressure.
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Foods That Can Spike Your Blood Pressure
With high blood pressure “on the rise” in American society more and more of us are following the health conscious trend to protect our bodies. But what many people don’t know is that there are specific foods that can spike your blood pressure alone.
With a third of our nation suffering from overly high blood pressure, hypertension, and another third suffering from prehypertension, the precursor, these foods should be strongly avoided if you’re concerned with keeping your heart pumping normally.
What A Sudden Drop In Blood Pressure Means
Sudden drops in blood pressure can occur for any number of reasons, some of which may be incidental and of no real concern, while others may the sign of a potentially life-threatening condition.
Sudden drops in blood pressure are often recognized by symptoms ranging from mild lightheadedness and fatigue to severe heart rhythm problems and respiratory distress.
Although low blood pressure is easily diagnosed with a blood pressure cuff , the underlying cause of sudden, severe drops may require extensive investigation, including a physical exam, lab tests, cardiac monitoring, and imaging studies.
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Gerd And Hypertension: Linked
To try to assess how often the two conditions occur simultaneously, a small study published in the September 2018 issue of the Journal of Clinical Gastroenterology looked at a group of people with hypertension. It found that 44 percent also had GERD, and that reflux attacks and blood pressure spikes were connected. When they took proton-pump inhibitors , a type of acid reflex drug that reduces stomach acids, both their GERD symptoms and blood pressure improved.
“In this study, GERD is associated with increased risk of high blood pressure, or hypertension, and blood pressure can actually improve with treatment of the acid reflux,” explains William J. Bulsiewicz, MD, a gastroenterologist in Mount Pleasant, South Carolina, and author of the forthcoming book Fiber Fueled. “The question is ‘why?'”
“At the moment, we don’t have a clear answer, only theories,” Dr. Bulsiewicz says. “One possibility is that acid reflux activates the sympathetic nervous system, which is essentially our adrenal system. When activated, our heart pumps faster and our blood vessels clamp down, leading to increased blood pressure,” he explains.
“The other theory,” he adds, “is that there is a common nerve connection in the brain that regulates both digestive function and cardiovascular reflexes, and therefore may lead to the co-existence of these issues.”
Osa And Resistant Hypertension
OSA is common in patients with resistant hypertension, which is defined as BP that remains uncontrolled with three or more medications. In a prospective evaluation of 41 patients with resistant hypertension, Logan et al found that 96% of the men and 65% of the women had significant OSA . In 71 consecutive subjects referred to the hypertension clinic at the University of Alabama at Birmingham for resistant hypertension, we found that 90% of the men and 77% of the women had OSA . As OSA severity increases, there is an increased need for additional BP medications that is, the more severe the OSA, the less likely BP is controlled with pharmacologic therapy.- A prospective, but uncontrolled CPAP trial demonstrated that CPAP use can have substantial antihypertensive benefit in patients with resistant hypertension. Logan et al reported that CPAP use after 2-month follow-up in 11 patients with resistant hypertension lowered nighttime systolic BP by 14.4±4.4 mm Hg and diastolic BP by 7.8±3.0 mm Hg.
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/6what Should You Do If You Observe Any Flare
If you have a prior history of cardiovascular complications or have been taking medications for a while, do not attempt to curtail off your medications in lieu of vaccination. Keep taking all medications, maintain proper records and most of all, be aware of the side effects beforehand. Consult a doctor before getting vaccinated, if you are someone who may be more at risk right now.
Hypertension Heart Disease More Likely Study Finds
Blood pressure spikes caused by moderate exercise may be a sign of future health issues, new research suggests.
High blood pressure induced by exercise may be an indicator of future heart problems.
Researchers at the Boston University School of Medicine found that high blood pressure resulting from moderate exercise puts young and middle-aged adults at greater risk of developing hypertension. And if high blood pressure lingers after exercise, their risk of cardiovascular disease and death also increases.
“The way our blood pressure changes during and after exercise provides important information on whether we will develop disease in the future,” researcher Vanessa Xanthakis, assistant professor of medicine and biostatistics, said in a statement. “This may help investigators evaluate whether this information can be used to better identify people who are at a higher risk of developing hypertension and CVD, or dying later in life.”
Blood pressure measures the force of blood against the arteries. Blood pressure numbers of less than 120/80 mm Hg are considered normal.
Xanthakis and her team evaluated blood pressure changes during and after moderate exercise in almost 2,000 participants enrolled in the 1993 Framingham Heart Study, a major U.S. heart study.
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What Happens To Blood Sugar While You Sleep
Itâs tied to whether the hormone insulin, which removes glucose from the blood, is working the way itâs supposed to. Blood sugar levels surge while youâre sleeping, usually around 4 to 8 a.m. for someone with a normal sleep schedule. In a healthy person, insulin can handle the surge by telling muscle, fat, and liver cells to absorb the glucose from the blood, which keeps your levels stable.
For people who have diabetes or who are likely to get it, insulin canât do that job very well, so blood sugar levels will rise higher.
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How Is Resistant Hypertension Treated
Treatment options for resistant hypertension or pseudo-resistant hypertension depend on your underlying conditions and how well you tolerate various medications. Treatments include:
- Addressing any conditions that may have caused the hypertension.
- Making lifestyle changes
- Adjusting medications to find your optimal type and dosage
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Tips For Making Healthy Lifestyle Changes
If you suffer with high blood pressure, its easy to feel intimidated by the changes you need to make in order to improve your health. While some people may only need to work on one or two areas to reduce their blood pressuregetting more exercise or quitting smoking, for examplemost of us find that we need to improve our habits in at least 3 or 4 areas. But even if you smoke, drink heavily, are overweight, stressed out, sedentary, and eat nothing but junk and processed food, that doesnt mean you have to tackle everything all at once. Making lots of different lifestyle changes at the same time can be overwhelming. And when we feel overwhelmed, its easy to opt for doing nothing rather than doing something.
Start gradually and make one or two changes to begin with. Once those changes have become habit, you can tackle one or two more, and so on. For example, you may decide to start by giving up smokingand adopting some relaxation techniques to help with the stress of quittingthen move on to losing weight or improving your diet.
Lose the all or nothing thinking. Doing something, no matter how small, is always better than doing nothing. If youre eating healthy food during the week, for example, then resorting to takeouts at the weekends, your blood pressure and overall health will still be in better shape than if you were eating takeout every day.
Blood Pressure Measuring Tips
Consider that when your blood pressure is being measured, your arm should be at the level of your heart. If the arm is hanging down whether you are sitting or standing, the arm should be extended out. If you are lying down, the arm should be along your side, leveled with your body.
Aside from being aware of your arm position, here are some other tips to keep in mind when having your blood pressure measured:
- Rest for about five minutes before the reading is taken.
- Try not to eat or exercise for 30 minutes before a screening.
- Have your reading in the morning, since your bodys rhythms can cause blood pressure to rise in the afternoon and evening.
- Have your pressure taken from all three positions: sitting, standing, and lying down.
- Have your blood pressure taken three times in one session with one minute of rest between each test.
Dont get caught up in comparing your blood pressure to others. Instead, know that there is a healthy blood pressure level for each sex and specific age. Here you can find an age and gender chart you can check to see what your healthy range is.
Monitoring your blood pressure on a regular basis can give you the most accurate picture of what is happening with your blood pressure. There are some common factors that can impact your pressure readings. Many are related to lifestyle and include smoking, diet, and physical activity level. Family history can also play a role, as can stress.
How Dangerous Is High Blood Pressure?
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What Is The Best Treatment For High Blood Pressure
Treatment frequently begins with lifestyle adjustments alone if your BP puts you in the elevated or stage 1 category, with an otherwise very low risk of developing heart disease over the following 10 years. Just like the risk factors above put you in the crosshairs of HBP, reducing those risk factors can help bring your BP back down.
Heres where to start:
Resting Heart Rate During The Night
Nightly average RHR varies widely between individuals. A normal heart rate can range anywhere from 40 to 100 beats per minute and still be considered average. It can also change from day to day, depending on your hydration level, elevation, physical activity, and body temperature. As with many of your bodys signals, its best to compare your RHR with your own baseline. Avoid comparisons to those around you.
When looking at your RHR curve, pay special attention to these three things:
- Your trend: Does your RHR go up, down, or stay level during the night?
- Your lowest point: When is your RHR lowest?
- Your end: Right before you wake up, does your RHR change?
With these questions in mind, here are three patterns you may recognize in the night-time heart rate curves you can see with Oura:
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Blood Pressure Changes And Anxiety
Anxiety is the activation of your fight or flight system a system designed to keep you safe from harm when no danger is present. The fight or flight system causes a number of physical changes that would help you respond to a predator or threat if one was present, but can be distressing when they occur without that danger.
Different types of anxiety can affect your blood pressure in different ways. To understand how anxiety can impact blood pressure, first you must gain a basic understanding of blood pressure and how it fluctuates.
Finally, it is always important to remember that blood pressure fluctuates throughout the day due to exertion, diet, hydration, and more. Blood pressure is not constant even if you do not have any anxiety. So “high blood pressure” may not be high blood pressure at all, and may instead be a reading during one of these fluctuations.
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While COVID vaccination drives have picked up pace, there are also some side effects that can happen once the jab is injected into the body. Fever, weakness, malaise, pain at the injection site being some of the common ones. However, that being said, there could also be some unusual reactions that can strike.
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What Are The Symptoms Of High Blood Pressure
Most people with high blood pressure have no symptoms, and feel quite well. This is why its important to see your doctor and have your blood pressure checked regularly, especially if you have one or more of the risk factors listed above.
A few people with very high blood pressure may experience headache, dizziness or the sudden effects of diseases of the arteries such as chest pain or stroke.
Check your symptoms with healthdirects online Symptom Checker to get advice on when to seek medical attention.