High blood pressure has been identified by the World Health Organization as the deadliest and but most preventable epidemic in all of history.
The results of untreated, long-term high blood pressure can be catastrophic, even if the elevation isn’t very high or what would be considered a medical emergency.
Migraine headaches, irritability and sleep disturbances are what some would consider to be very frustrating symptoms of high blood pressure.
Alone, they wouldn’t necessarily be deadly, but other conditions that are caused by untreated or unmanaged hypertension certainly are.
Here are six examples:
#1- Stroke/aneurism- high blood pressure weakens arteries. Two things happen after that- either the vessel ruptures; causing blood to leak out into the brain as with stroke, or the vessel herniates, bulging dangerously against brain tissue or even rupturing down the road.
#2- Heart failure The constant insult to the blood vessels with hypertension damages the tissue they are supposed to feed. In the heart, damaged or enlarged tissue is catastrophic.
#3- Dementia- Following the logic that everywhere your arteries lead can be damaged if those arteries become weak and/or hardened, limiting blood flow, it is easy to see how areas of the brain, which cannot ever be repaired once damaged, can fall victim to cell death. A growing body of evidence is showing that dementia- spectrum diseases are increasingly linked to high blood pressure.
#4- Vision impairment- Even the tiniest of blood vessels, such as those that supply oxygen and nutrients to your eyes, will become damaged with the insult of high blood pressure. Every millimeter of the eye has a function in vision, and every millimeter depends upon healthy blood flow. Studies are emerging practically every few months that show many kinds of vision impairment are a result of hypertension.
#5- Erectile dysfunction- Know what happens to the ‘man parts’ if the blood doesn’t flow effectively? They don’t work. Sure, there are drugs out there to help correct it, temporarily, but they come with a litany of side effects- especially if you are already being treated for high blood pressure with other pharmaceuticals.
#6- Bone loss- Many people wouldn’t consider this to be a life-threatening condition. But with bone loss comes the very dangerous problem of fracture. People expect older seniors to be at risk of falls or fractures because they are more fragile.
But many folks in their 50s and 60s who are hypertensive also are at dangerous risk of fracture due to bone loss. And, this age group is still in the workforce, for large part.
The time is now to get your blood pressure under control- it doesn’t have to be hard or dangerous, as with pills.