Understanding High Blood Pressure: Causes, Risks & Prevention

Higher blood pressure depends upon more blood pumped through the heart and higher resistance in blood flow. High blood pressure (hypertension) leads to health complications and even death. It's a good idea to avoid activities that cause hypertension.

• Patient with a blood-pressure monitor

Significance

• Hypertension causes complications in the body such as aneurysms, atherosclerosis, stroke and heart failure. Severe versions of these complications sometimes lead to death.

Lifestyle

• Sedentary and overweight people need more blood pumped, so they have higher heart rates and tend to have hypertension. Those who consume too much salt (sodium) also get hypertension because salt causes the body to retain water and thus increase resistance to blood flow.

Damage

• Tobacco smokers inhale chemicals that damage and narrow the arteries. This causes more resistance to blood flowing through the body.

Considerations

• Multiple causes of hypertension sometimes combine to make it more serious. For example, stress increases blood pressure temporarily. High blood pressure lasts longer if smoking, alcohol use or overeating are used to cope with stress.

Prevention

• Because hypertension usually has no symptoms, regular blood pressure readings from a doctor or blood-pressure monitor help give you a warning when blood pressure gets too high.