What Is The Meaning Of Blood Pressure

Diagnosing High Blood Pressure

The only way to find out whether you have high blood pressure is to have your blood pressure checked regularly. Ask your GP when you are next due for yours to be checked.

Before having your blood pressure taken, you should rest for at least five minutes and empty your bladder. To get an accurate blood pressure reading, you should be sitting down and not talking when the reading is taken.

Having one high blood pressure reading does not necessarily mean that you have high blood pressure. Your blood pressure can change throughout the day. Feeling anxious or stressed when you visit your GP can raise your blood pressure .

Therefore, your GP will need to take several readings over a set period of time, usually every month, to see whether your blood pressure level is consistently high.

Blood and urine tests may also be carried out in order to check for conditions that are known to cause an increase in blood pressure, such as kidney infections.

You may also be given a blood pressure device to take home so that you can record your blood pressure level throughout the day. This also helps to identify white coat syndrome and therefore helps to identify the best treatment options for you.

What Medications Are Used To Treat High Blood Pressure

Four classes of high blood pressure medications are considered first line when starting treatment. Sometimes other medications are coupled with these first-line drugs to better control your high blood pressure. First-line, pressure-lowering medications are:

• Angiotensin-converting enzyme inhibitors block the production of the angiotensin II hormone, which the body naturally uses to control blood pressure. When angiotensin II is blocked, your blood vessels dont narrow. Examples: lisinopril , enalapril or captopril.
• Angiotensin II receptor blockers block this same hormone from binding with receptors in the blood vessels. ARBs work the same way as ACE inhibitors to keep blood vessels from narrowing. Examples: metoprolol , valsartan or losartan.
• Calcium channel blockers prevent calcium from entering the muscle cells of your heart and blood vessels, allowing these vessels to relax. Examples: amlodipine , nifedipine , diltiazem .
• Diuretics flush excess sodium from your body, reducing the amount of fluid in your blood. Diuretics are often used with other high blood pressure medicines, sometimes in one combined pill. Examples: indapamide, hydrochlorothiazide or chlorothiazide.

What’s The Difference Between Blood Pressure And Pulse

While your blood pressure is the force of your blood moving through your blood vessels, your heart rate is the number of times your heart beats per minute.

• They are two separate measurements and indicators of health.
• For people with high blood pressure , theres no substitute for measuring blood pressure.

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Signs And Symptoms Of Hypertension

Often, kids and teens with pre-hypertension or stage 1 hypertension wont show any symptoms at all. If your child has stage 2 hypertension, she might experience one or more of the following symptoms:

• headaches
• abdominal pain
• breathing problems

An infant with stage 2 hypertension may seem irritable, not be feeding properly, or vomiting. Sometimes these infants are diagnosed with failure to thrive.

What Do The Readings Mean

As a general guide:

140/90mmHg or over you may have high blood pressureMost doctors use 140/90mmHg as the cut off for point for diagnosing . This is the point where your risk of serious health problems goes up. They might prescribe and advise you to make changes to your to bring your blood pressure down. 120/80mmHg up to 140/90mmHg pre-high blood pressureAlso called high-normal blood pressure. This is not high blood pressure, but it is a little higher than it should be and means you could go on to develop high blood pressure. See how you can make to lower it. 90/60mmHg up to 120/80mmHg ideal blood pressureAlso called normal blood pressure. Your blood pressure reading is healthy. At this level you have a much lower risk of heart disease and stroke. Following a will help you to keep it in the healthy range. 90/60mmHg or lower you may have low blood pressure usually isnt a problem, but it can sometimes make you feel faint or dizzy or could be a sign of another health problem.

The video below explains how your blood pressure numbers are linked to the risk of stroke and other disease.

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How Serious Is Your Hypertension

Doctors classify hypertension according to systolic pressure and diastolic pressure readings and the effects various levels can have on your health.

Hypertension, or high blood pressure, is a health condition that affects about one in three American adults. But not everyone who has hypertension has high blood pressure to the same degree. Doctors use four hypertension categories to help classify how likely your blood pressure level is to affect your health: prehypertension, stage 1, stage 2, and hypertensive crisis.

Normal Blood Pressure

Blood pressure is measured by taking two different measurements of the pressure within your arteries: systolic pressure and diastolic pressure. Systolic pressure, the first or top number of the blood pressure reading, is the highest level of pressure in your arteries, which occurs when your heart muscle contracts and forces a burst of blood into the aorta. Diastolic pressure, which is the bottom number, is the pressure that exists within your arteries between heart muscle contractions, which is when your heart is filling with blood.

If your blood pressure reading is less than 120/80 millimeters of mercury or mm Hg , you have normal blood pressure. This means that your systolic pressure is less than 120 mm/Hg and your diastolic reading is less than 80 mm/Hg.

Prehypertension: When Blood Pressure Is Above Normal

Stage 1 and Stage 2 Hypertension

Hypertensive Crisis: A High Blood Pressure Emergency

Habits For Promoting Healthy Blood Pressure

Blood pressure is greatly influenced by lifestyle, so most healthy people can properly manage blood pressure without medical intervention.

Keeping body weight within a normal range, eating a heart-healthy diet, decreasing mental stress and having a regular aerobic exercise routine can have a profound effect on blood pressure, Kazemi said.

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Determinants Of Arterial Pressure

The main determinant of arterial pressure is the stretch of the walls of the arteries by the volume they contain. This volume increases in systole because inflow exceeds outflow and falls after the peak of ejection because outflow exceeds inflow. The outflow is dependent upon the resistance emptying the arterial tree and the elastance of the vessel walls. The product of the inverse of elastance and the downstream resistance gives the time constant of emptying of the arterial vessels. The time constant is the time it takes to get to 63% of a new steady state after a step change in flow or pressure. Time constants are important in pulsatile systems because they set the amount of filling and emptying of aortic volume that can occur based on the cardiac frequency, the proportions of contraction and relaxation times during systole, and the diastole time.

Clinical Significance Of White

White-coat hypertension is a condition in which a patient has high blood pressure in the office but normal blood pressure outside the office. Generally, 24-h ambulatory blood pressure monitoring or home blood pressure monitoring may be used to identify white-coat hypertension. Ishikuro et al. reported that among pregnant women who were normotensive, the white-coat effect during pregnancy was 4.1/3.8, 3.4/1.6, and 1.8/2.4mmHg in early, mid-, and late pregnancy, respectively . When the factors affecting the white-coat effect were examined in the same population, no significant differences were found for body mass in sex, age, or family history of hypertension. However, the effect was significantly greater in primiparas than in multiparas in early pregnancy for systolic blood pressure and in late pregnancy for diastolic blood pressure . A meta-analysis of 16 studies on the white-coat effect showed that office blood pressure measurements were 4/3 mmHg higher than home blood pressure measurements . White-coat hypertension is prevalent in women with preexisting diabetes and may indicate an increased risk of developing pregnancy-induced hypertensive disorders later in life .

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What Is Diastolic Blood Pressure

The heart rests between beats so it can refill with blood. Doctors call this pause between beats “diastole.” Your diastolic blood pressure is the measurement during this pause before the next heartbeat.

A normal diastolic blood pressure during quiet rest is 80 mmHg or a little below. If you have high blood pressure, the diastolic number is often higher even during quiet rest.

Low diastolic pressure may be seen with dehydration or with severe bleeding. It also may happen if the arteries relax and widen.

Why Is Hypertension An Important Issue In Low

The prevalence of hypertension varies across regions and country income groups. The WHO African Region has the highest prevalence of hypertension while the WHO Region of the Americas has the lowest prevalence of hypertension .

The number of adults with hypertension increased from 594 million in 1975 to 1.13 billion in 2015, with the increase seen largely in low- and middle-income countries. This increase is due mainly to a rise in hypertension risk factors in those populations.

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How Is High Blood Pressure Treated

Treatment for hypertension depends on how high your blood pressure is, as well as your lifestyle and risk factors.

For elevated blood pressure, the goal is to keep your blood pressure from developing into clinical hypertension. No medications are necessary at this stage. Your doctor may recommend:

• losing weight if you have overweight or obesity

For stage 1 hypertension, your doctor may recommend lifestyle changes as mentioned above, as well as:

• reducing your sodium intake
• finding healthy ways to manage your stress
• medication, if your blood pressure doesnt improve after 1 month of lifestyle changes

For stage 2 hypertension, the typical treatment, in addition to a healthier lifestyle, is medication. Your doctor may prescribe one or more of the following medications to help lower your blood pressure:

• ACE inhibitors to block substances that tighten blood vessels
• alpha blockers to help relax the arteries
• beta-blockers to decrease your heart rate and block substances that tighten blood vessels
• calcium channel blockers to relax blood vessels and decrease the work of your heart
• diuretics to decrease the amount of fluid in your body, including your blood vessels

A hypertensive crisis requires immediate treatment. Medications may be given orally or intravenously .

The most for a hypertensive crisis include:

• vasodilators, such as hydralazine, nitroglycerin, and nitroprusside
• beta-blockers, such as labetalol and esmolol

What Does The Systolic Blood Pressure Number Mean

When your heart beats, it squeezes and pushes blood through your arteries to the rest of your body. This force creates pressure on those blood vessels, and that’s your systolic blood pressure.

Hereâs how to understand your systolic blood pressure number:

• Normal: Below 120
• Stage 1 high blood pressure : 130-139
• Stage 2 hypertension: 140 or more
• Hypertensive crisis: 180 or more. Call 911.

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Which Blood Pressure Number Is Important

Q.When I am monitoring my blood pressure, which number is most important top, bottom, or both?

A. While both numbers in a blood pressure reading are essential for diagnosing and treating high blood pressure, doctors primarily focus on the top number, also known as systolic pressure.

Systolic pressure reflects the force produced by the heart when it pumps blood out to the body, while diastolic blood pressure is the pressure in your blood vessels when the heart is at rest.

Over the years, research has found that both numbers are equally important in monitoring heart health. However, most studies show a greater risk of stroke and heart disease related to higher systolic pressures compared with elevated diastolic pressures. Thats especially true in people ages 50 and older, which is why doctors tend to monitor the top number more closely. The reason for the difference in risk may be related to the force put on the arteries when blood rushes out of the heart.

The American Heart Association now defines high blood pressure as 130/80 mm Hg or higher. The new guidelines recommend you check your blood pressure often, ideally with a home monitor, to help your doctor determine if you need to make lifestyle changes, begin medication, or alter your current therapy.

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Associations Between Blood Pressure And Brainage

Associations between BrainAGE and mean, diastolic and systolic BP are presented in Figure 2. None of the analyses revealed an interaction between BP and Time-in-Study or a random effect of blood pressure on BrainAGE indicating that a change in BrainAGE over time was not predicted by baseline BP or by a change of BP over time . Therefore, only fixed effects are reported below.

Figure 2. Summary of blood pressure measures as predictor of BrainAGE. Note. Whiskers indicate 95% confidence intervals. Dashed line indicates zero. Interaction indicates interaction term between listed predictor and blood pressure measures . Statistically significant coefficients are depicted in pink. All coefficients except for the base model control for sex, cohort, time in study, smoking, education, physical activity, BMI, diabetes, depression, APOE 4 carrier status, alcohol intake, hypertension, and hypertensive medication . Model coefficients can be found in Table 1, and Supplementary Tables 24.

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What Is A Good Blood Pressure

Its important to emphasize that a good blood pressure reading depends on your own individual health. Your provider will be able to tell you whats healthy and safe given your personal health circumstances.

Nonetheless, below are guidelines from the American Heart Association for people in general. Remember: Your blood can be temporarily high or low at times . This chart applies to how your blood pressure is normally, which is why you may want to take an average of several readings before seeing where you fall.

Blood pressure category

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What’s The Impact Of Having High Blood Pressure

High blood pressure is a major risk factor for developing cardiovascular diseases such as:

• coronary heart disease – where the main arteries that supply your heart become clogged up with plaques
• strokes – a serious condition where the blood supply to your brain is interrupted
• heart attacks – a serious condition where the blood supply to part of your heart is blocked

Diabetes and kidney disease are also linked to high blood pressure complications.

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What About Blood Pressure Thats Too Low

Low blood pressure is known as hypotension. In adults, a blood pressure reading of 90/60 mm Hg or below is often considered hypotension.

Hypotension can be dangerous because blood pressure thats too low doesnt supply your body and heart with enough oxygenated blood.

Some potential causes of hypotension can include:

• heart problems

Regulation Of Blood Pressure

The endogenous, homeostatic regulation of arterial pressure is not completely understood, but the following mechanisms of regulating arterial pressure have been well-characterized:

These different mechanisms are not necessarily independent of each other, as indicated by the link between the RAS and aldosterone release. When blood pressure falls many physiological cascades commence in order to return the blood pressure to a more appropriate level.

The blood pressure fall is detected by a decrease in blood flow and thus a decrease in glomerular filtration rate .

Decrease in GFR is sensed as a decrease in Na+ levels by the macula densa.

The macula densa causes an increase in Na+ reabsorption, which causes water to follow in via osmosis and leads to an ultimate increase in plasma volume. Further, the macula densa releases adenosine which causes constriction of the afferent arterioles.

At the same time, the juxtaglomerular cells sense the decrease in blood pressure and release renin.

Renin converts angiotensinogen to angiotensin I .

Angiotensin I flows in the bloodstream until it reaches the capillaries of the lungs where angiotensin-converting enzyme acts on it to convert it into angiotensin II.

Angiotensin II is a vasoconstrictor that will increase blood flow to the heart and subsequently the preload, ultimately increasing the cardiac output.

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Do I Have High Blood Pressure

Anyone can have high blood pressure. Some medical conditions, such as metabolic syndrome, kidney disease, and thyroid problems, can cause high blood pressure. Some people have a greater chance of having it because of things they can’t change. These are:

• Age. The chance of having high blood pressure increases as you get older, especially isolated systolic hypertension.
• Gender. Before age 55, men have a greater chance of having high blood pressure. Women are more likely to have high blood pressure after menopause.
• Family history. High blood pressure tends to run in some families.
• Race. African Americans are at increased risk for high blood pressure.

High blood pressure often has no signs or symptoms, but routine checks of your blood pressure will help detect increasing levels. If your blood pressure reading is high at two or more check-ups, the doctor may also ask you to measure your blood pressure at home.

There are important considerations for older adults in deciding whether to start treatment for high blood pressure if it is above 130/80, including other health conditions and overall fitness. Your doctor may work with you to find a blood pressure target that is best for your well-being and may suggest exercise, changes in your diet, and medications.

Heart Rate And Exercise

In discussions about high blood pressure, you will often see heart rate mentioned in relation to exercise. Your target heart rate is based on age and can help you monitor the intensity of your exercise.

• If you measure your heart rate before, during and after physical activity, youll notice it will increase over the course of the exercise.
• The greater the intensity of the exercise, the more your heart rate will increase.
• When you stop exercising, your heart rate does not immediately return to your normal heart rate.
• The more fit you are, the sooner your heart rate will return to normal.

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