A Basic Understanding of High Blood Pressure.

The Phrase High Blood Pressure conjures up a variety of things to all people. Common definitions refer to the condition without refereeing to the cause.

Dubbed the Silent Killer because of the insidious way it works away in the background of someone's health. High blood pressure if left untreated and ignored can lead to lethal complications in a wide variety of illnesses.

In the United States of America alone their estimate to be 50 million sufferers of High Blood Pressure. It would appear in certain cases but there are greater percentage of sufferers of high blood pressure amongst the black community as opposed to those in the white or Hispanic community in the USA

The knock on effect of high blood pressure would appear to be worse for those within the black community. It would appear that the risks and incidences of high blood pressure increase proportionately with age with over three quarters of women and 4/6 of men over the age of 75 being classified as sufferers.

High blood pressure is twice as common among people who are obese as among those who are not.

In the United States, only an estimated two of three people with high blood pressure have been diagnosed. Of these people, about 75% receive drug treatment, and of these, about 45% receive adequate treatment.

Two terms are used when calculating high blood pressure, the systolic which is the first and greater of the two figures and refers to the highest pressure of the Arteries. The diastolic figure is the second figure calculated and represents the pressure in the hall product to the process of contraction again.

Blood pressure figures are written as two numbers, the first over the second (120 over 80) and is calculated in millimetres of mercury which is the traditional form of measurement In the early days it was felt that high blood pressure started when the diastolic pressure walls at a minimum average over 140 mm Hg all the diastolic figure was greater than 90 mm Hg.

However, the higher the blood pressure, the greater the risks-even within the normal blood pressure range-so these limits are somewhat arbitrary. The limits were established because people with blood pressure above these levels are at increasing risk of complications.

It has been found that where High Blood Pressure has been brought about through increased age that it is not unusual to see a normal diastolic pressure matched with a raised systolic figure.

This disorder is called isolated systolic hypertension. Blood pressure that is more than 180/110 mm Hg and does not produce any symptoms is " a hypertensive urgency.

There has been an additional condition recognized as malignant hypertension and this occurs when blood pressure readings are in excess of 210/120 mm Hg. This additional condition has only been known to occur in Approximately 1 out of every 200 incidences of high blood pressure.

Again the incidences of malignant hypertension is greater within the black community and amongst those people from the socioeconomic groups. Malignant hypertension unlike hypertensive urgency produces a variety of symptoms. Malignant hypertension if left untreated can lead to fatal consequences within six months.

Article Source: http://www.a1-optimization.com/articles

Scott James writes regularly on High Blood Pressure issues and more information on the above can be found at High Blood Pressure ,High Blood Pressure Symptom and also at www.livingwithhighbloodpressure.net/treatment.html

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