(HealthDay News) — While the number of Americans with high blood pressure has not declined in recent years, researchers report that the good news is that more people with the condition have it under control.
High blood pressure, also known as hypertension, is a major risk factor for heart attack, stroke and other cardiovascular problems; it was considered such an important health issue that achieving a 50 percent control rate was made an official Healthy People 2010 goal.
That goal has been achieved, said Dr. Brent M. Egan, a professor of medicine and pharmacology at the Medical University of South Carolina and lead author of the report in the May 26 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association. That report used data from a series of national health surveys running from 1988 to 2008.
“The good news is that blood pressure control has improved very substantially over the years,” Egan said. “It went from 27 percent of all hypertensives to 50 percent, with most of the progress since 2000. Awareness of high blood pressure improved from 69 to 81 percent, and the number of hypertensives on treatment improved from 54 percent to 72 percent.”
The bad news is that the number of Americans with high blood pressure has not gone down. “We’re doing a lousy job of trying to prevent it,” Egan said. An estimated 65 million Americans, about 29 percent of the population, now have high blood pressure, a far cry from the national goal of 16 percent.
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The reason the number of Americans with high blood pressure has not gone down is because doctors keep throwing pills at people who then think popping a pill will fix the problem. The only ‘fix’ is if doctors can convince people to adopt a healthy life style, which may mean to drastically change the way they eat, drink and exercise. I know people with diabetes, hypertension, obesity, etc. who continue to drink too much, eat too much, don’t exercise, because the pill(s) they pop each allows them to do so. At least that’s the way they think.
It is easier to pop pills than make the effort to change eating and drinking habits.
couldn’t agree more with the previous post. Changing your lifestyle has a profound effect on your BP as well as your overall health, whereas popping a pill and not changing will not have nearly the profound effect on one’s overall health. Masking the symptoms while going about one’s merry way is a path to diabetes, heart and kidney disease etc whereas taking control of one’s health with diet,exercise etc will lead to true health and longevity.
I AGREE. A large percentage of folks with HBP would greatly benefit from improved diet and regular exercise, cutting the number of cases drastically. This would improve people’s health in all areas and reduce the number of “pills” people take to control their HBP. That said, there will be a percentage of people who do ALL of those things and still have high readings. The effect of stress on us is underestimated where HBP is concerned. Stress management is key but many people have difficulty getting a handle on this one. If you are “wired” for HBP, as some people are, the body just reacts as if it is under stress, even with the small stuff. Some of these people have a possible anxiety disorder that needs to be addressed and sometimes medication for that will bring down the BP.