This is Everyday Science with Clare Wilson, a subscriber-only newsletter from The i Paper. If you’d like to get this direct to your inbox every week, you can sign up here.
Hello, and welcome back to Everyday Science.
When is the right age to get your blood pressure checked out? You might think it is something only older people need to worry about. The NHS invites people to go for five-yearly heart health checks that include blood pressure from the age of 40 onwards.
But according to a new study, that is far too late – even people in their twenties and thirties should know their blood pressure.
The research also suggested there are twice as many people as thought who have high blood pressure and don’t know about it. So, who is most at risk of having unsuspected high blood pressure, and what can they do about it?
It is hard to overstate how important blood pressure is as a cause of disease. Its consequences include heart attacks, strokes, kidney damage and dementia.
High blood pressure is often described as the biggest modifiable risk factor for ill health. “Blood pressure is a silent killer and is the biggest killer in the world,” said Dr Ajay Gupta, a cardiovascular medicine expert at Queen Mary University of London (QMUL).
Blood pressure is simply the force that blood exerts on the walls of our blood vessels as it whooshes round the body. It is given as two numbers, such as 120/80 millimeters of mercury (mm/Hg) because the force is higher during each heart beat and lower between the beats.
When blood pressure is too high – in the UK defined as over 140/90 – blood vessels become stiffer over time, which makes it easier for plaques to form on them, which can eventually lead to heart attacks and strokes.
Narrowed blood vessels
Smaller blood vessels also become stiffer and thinner, restricting blood flow, which can lead to kidney damage and dementia.
Fortunately we have many effective medications to lower blood pressure, but these can only be offered if the problem is discovered. It is often said that a third of people with high blood pressure are unaware of it.
But the latest research suggests this is a bigger problem than we thought. It used an ongoing UK study, where 1.4 million adults have so far had their blood pressure measured. A third of them had high blood pressure, and six in 10 of those were unaware of it.
These figures may not be exactly right, as people should really have the measurement taken at home when they are fully relaxed, to ensure it is a true reflection of their blood pressure. But they should still ring alarm bells, said Dr Iain Turnbull, an academic GP at the University of Oxford who was involved in the study
It also found high blood pressure present in 15 per cent of participants who were aged between 18 and 39. That’s alarming as those people would not even be invited for heart health checks, said Dr Turnbull.
“If you don’t get your blood pressure measured, then you wouldn’t know that you have high blood pressure because it is asymptomatic in the majority of cases, and would go undetected,” he said. The work was published in the journal, BMJ Public Health.
No appointment needed
People who are too young for those health checks can still go to their GP and ask for a blood pressure measurement anyway. But there are even easier ways to find out this key health measurement.
Pharmacists will also measure blood pressure for you. Many GP waiting rooms have a machine that you can operate yourself – no appointment needed. And home measuring machines with arm cuffs can be bought for about £25.
But phone apps, or wearable devices like smart watches or rings have generally not been shown to be as accurate as standard blood pressure machines that use an arm cuff, said Dr Manish Saxena, a hypertension expert at QMUL. “They are not validated devices for blood pressure measurement yet in the UK,” Dr Saxena added.
While anyone can have high blood pressure, certain groups are at higher risk, pointed out Dr Turnbull. These include people who have a family history of high blood pressure or heart attacks or strokes.
Other risk factors including being overweight, smoking or drinking to excess. Certain ethnic groups are also at higher risk, including those who are South Asian or Black.
Another cause can be a salty diet. That’s because sodium, a constituent of salt, is a key mineral in body fluids and its blood level must not get too high, so the body dilutes high sodium by retaining more water in blood, which raises blood pressure.
If you’re trying to get your blood pressure in check after a high reading, hold the salt (Photo: Tang Ming Tung/Getty Images)This offers a way that people can lower their blood pressure without medication. Anyone who finds that they have slightly high blood pressure will usually be advised to try lifestyle changes before starting drug treatment.
Those would involve things like trying to lose weight, cut out smoking and so on. But those changes can be hard to stick to. For some, a more achievable goal is to reduce salt consumption by replacing ordinary table salt with low-sodium salt.
Dr Gupta said the NHS is missing a trick by starting blood pressure screening only when people turn 40. He has recently argued in the Journal of the American Heart Association that adults under 40 who have one of the known risk factors should be invited by their GP to send in a blood pressure reading or make an appointment for a GP measurement.
“The risk of slightly high blood pressure in your twenties and thirties is often ignored, but these are people who are likely to get dementia when they’re older, as well as the cardiovascular risk,” he said.
Ignoring high blood pressure would be like homeowners ignoring a termite infestation, he said. “You do not see the termites, but after many years, your building collapses. This disease is like having termites.”
I’ve also written
Vaccines are one of modern medicine’s greatest inventions. But the UK’s childhood vaccination rates have been going backwards for years. There are several causes, but if one can be singled out, it must be the efforts of Andrew Wakefield, a British former doctor who began waging a crusade against vaccines in the 1990s.
Wakefield’s claims had such deep and long-lasting impact that its ripples are still being felt, and his views have gained new prominence in the US. How did such an unscientific movement gain any credence and why hasn’t it yet been stamped out?
I’ve been watching
I’m not usually one for war films, but I enjoyed Pressure, about the meteorologists involved in timing the D-Day landings. The plot might not sound all that exciting, based on the last-minute wrangling over whether to invade Germany on 5 or 6 June. But the decision turns into another kind of war – this time between two competing approaches to weather forecasting, the old American techniques against the new British method.
Even though you know (probably) know the ending, there is drama aplenty, and Andrew Scott plays the UK’s chief meteorologist with masterful disdain for his US counterpart.
Hence then, the article about the silent killer blood pressure problem that affects under 40s too was published today ( ) and is available on inews ( Middle East ) The editorial team at PressBee has edited and verified it, and it may have been modified, fully republished, or quoted. You can read and follow the updates of this news or article from its original source.
Read More Details
Finally We wish PressBee provided you with enough information of ( The ‘silent killer’ blood pressure problem that affects under-40s too )
Also on site :