Is high blood pressure really harmful to health?

According to World Health Organization, high blood pressure (also known as raised blood pressure or hypertension) can lead to heart attack, stroke and other serious health problems.

 

However, it is not very accurate to measure a person’s blood pressure. It depends on, for example, season of a year, time of a day, left hand or right hand used and of course, a person’s emotion at the time of measurement. A phenomenon so-called “White Coat Hypertension" may also occur when a person sees a staff wearing a white robe in the hospital, his or her blood pressure would automatically rise higher than the normal of 140/90 mmHg.

 

Several studies found that high blood pressure does not increase the chance of stroke or mortality. It even has a protective effect on the elderly. From 840 elderly patients who participated in the EWPHEuropean Working Party on Hypertension in the Elderly) trial, it was found that there was no evidence of high blood pressure increases the risk of stroke.

 

The reason why blood pressure rises is the result of self-regulation in human body. In the elderly, there is reduced elasticity in blood vessel and it is comparatively narrower. And so the increase in blood pressure helps increase blood flow to body organs and tissues. In Japan, a study found that taking anti-hypertensive drugs would even worsen the case for dementia patients.

 

In addition, the hardening of the arteries is to enhance the protection of blood vessel from vascular pressure so as to prevent bursting. The hardening of the arteries occurs only in the peripheral blood vessels in the heart and not in the myocardial blood vessel which is tightly surrounded by the muscle.

 

The largest antihypertensive trial and the second largest lipid-lowering trial in North America, ALLHAT, with a total of 42,418 patients enrolled between February 23, 1994 and January 31, 1998. found that diuretics were better than ACEI and CCB (the two new blood pressure lowering drugs) in the prevention of coronary heart disease and with fewer side effects. But the prices of the new drugs were 200 times more expensive.