What is blood pressure, and why is it important?

MEDICINE

In simplistic terms, blood pressure is a measurement of the force with which your blood is pumped round your body. It is the pressure that your pumping blood places on the walls of your arteries, the blood vessels that carry blood away from your heart.

The easiest way of understanding the concept of BP is to think of water pumping through a garden hose. When it does so, the water places pressure on the walls of the hose as it tries to ‘escape’ in any possible direction. And in the same way that you increase the pressure on the walls of your garden hose if you increase the water flow by turning the water tap or faucet on a little more, your blood pressure increases if your heart starts pumping more blood around your body for some reason in exactly the same way.

Your exact blood pressure is measured by reference to two different factors. The first of these factors is the strength of each heartbeat, whilst the second is the resistance put up by the ‘tubes’ through which you blood passes, primarily your capillaries and arteries.

It is the arterioles, the tiny blood vessels that feed into the capillary network that regulate blood pressure more than any other part of your body. These arterioles expand and contract in rhythm with the beating of your heart as result of the muscular tissue in their walls. Hence, measuring blood pressure is in effect checking the strength or weakness of your heart. Your blood pressure is measured by reference to two different numbers which represent the systolic and diastolic pressures.

The first of these, the systolic is a measurement of the highest pressure point which is recorded when the heart beats or contracts. The lower figure, the diastolic is a measurement of what is happening when your heart is at rest, effectively representing the low point of your blood pressure.
As a general rule, it is the diastolic pressure measurement which medical professionals pay most attention to, because if your diastolic

pressure is too high, it suggests that your arteries and capillaries are under too much pressure even when your heart is at rest.In an average non stressed adult, normal blood pressure would be in the region of 120/80 mmHg. In fact, the better your physical condition, the lower your diastolic pressure measurement is likely to be, with well conditioned athletes regularly recording a diastolic pressure of between 50 and 60 mmHg.

However, according to the American Heart Association, nearly 1 in three adults in the USA suffers from high blood pressure.Much more terrifyingly, it is believed that anything from one third to one half of high blood pressure sufferers are completely unaware of their condition, which is one reason why your doctor always measures your blood pressure when you visit them irrespective of the condition that has brought you to their office or surgery in the first place.

High blood pressure is known by the medical profession as hypertension, but it is also possible to suffer from a slightly less serious form of the condition known as pre-hypertension as well. Although exact definitions of what represents high blood pressure varies to a certain degree from country to country, the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute suggests that in the USA, systolic pressure of between 120 and 139 or a diastolic pressure of between 80 and 89 mmHg represents pre-hypertension. Stage one hypertension is represented by systolic pressure of between 140 and 159 or diastolic pressure in the range of 90 to 99 mmHg, whilst stage two hypertension is demonstrated by a reading in excess of 160/100 mmHg.
                                         
    Why does it matter?
As suggested earlier, there are huge numbers of people in the USA (and in most industrialized Western countries) who suffer from high blood pressure that are not even aware of their condition.This is the primary reason why high blood pressure is often known as ‘the silent killer’ as many of the conditions to which high blood pressure contributes are often fatal. In effect, if you have high blood pressure condition that you are not aware of, you are considerably more at risk of suffering a wide variety of potentially lethal medical conditions without being in a position to take steps or measures to reduce the risk, hence, the ‘silent killer’ soubriquet.

   What are the symptoms?
One of the biggest problems for people who suffer high blood pressure is that a very significant percentage of them have no symptoms that might otherwise give them a clue that everything is not well. Some people do of course suffer symptoms that might give them an idea that they have a blood pressure problem. Given that high blood pressure naturally means that the pressure of blood being pumped around the body is too high, there are some conditions that might suggest a high blood pressure problem. For example, anyone who suffers persistent unexplained nosebleeds could have a high blood pressure problem as the weaker blood vessels in their nose inexplicably rupture. In a similar way, anyone who suffers from dizzy spells on a persistent basis or unexplained headaches may be suffering from high blood pressure as well as might someone who suffers blurred vision or even nausea.For many people however, high blood pressure has no symptoms whatsoever. And even in a situation where someone is suffering a symptom that could suggest a blood pressure problem, these symptoms will often be so mild that it is all too easy to assume that there is nothing seriously wrong.Similarly, it is unlikely that you would automatically assume that something like nausea or a headache is a symptom of high blood pressure. Consequently, it is far more likely that you would pop an aspirin when confronted by a condition of this nature rather than visiting your doctor for a blood pressure check.Hence you have the reason why your doctor will check your blood pressure every time you visit. It is nothing to do with the condition that took you to their surgery or office in the first place and much more to do with the fact that you have given them an opportunity to check your blood pressure, an opportunity which they cannot afford to miss. It becomes even more likely that your doctor will check you every time you visit as you age because it is a fact that high blood pressure is a problem that increases as you get older.But of course, the biggest difficulty with high blood pressure is that many of the people who have the problem do nothing about countering it simply because they are unaware that there is anything wrong. Consequently, they do not seek medical care or attention until some kind of serious organ damage is suffered, by which time it is often too late.

                                                        Hope this article was helpful.