What causes blood pressure to rise? Some people still believe that this is due to nervousness or stress. While anxiety or tension may temporarily make your blood pressure rise, there is no evidence that they are solely responsible for the condition. In short, your personality has nothing to do with your persistently elevated readings.
“It’s too bad that hypertension is the medical term for high blood pressure because it just adds to the popular misconception that an elevated pressure will simply go away if you relax, ‘take it easy’, or use tranquilizers. Of course, we should all try to deal with life’s problems calmly and with equanimity. But if you suffer from true hypertension, relaxing may lower your blood pressure a little, but it will not drop down to normal,” according to Dr. Isadore Rosenfeld of the New York Hospital – Memorial Sloan – Kettering Cancer Center in “The Best Treatment.”
Some cases of hypertension can be traced to kidney or heart disease, a tumor or adrenal gland problem. If an underlying cause is found, the condition is called secondary hypertension. However, in more than 90 percent of cases, the cause of high blood pressure is unknown. This is called primary or essential hypertension.
“Despite all the time and money spent on hypertension research, we still don’t understand why it happens in about 85 percent of cases. In 10 to 15 percent, a specific cause can be identified and usually involves kidney diseases, an overactive or underactive thyroid, or hormones secreted by the adrenal glands (such as adrenalin, noradrenalin, cortisol or aldosterone). Some of these abnormalities can be dramati?cally cured, often by surgery – e.g. removing a hormone-secreting tumor, or opening up a narrowed artery to the kidneys by balloon angioplasty or an operation. Your physician will know when and how to look for these relative?ly rare conditions,” Rosenfeld said.
But if none of these problems are present, hypertension could be the result of something else. Heredity appears to be a factor. Dr. William Manger, former chair of the U.S. National Hypertension Association, says your risk of developing hypertension increases to about 25 percent if you have one parent with the disease.
If both of your parents are hypertensive, your risk becomes more than 60 percent. Other factors that may increase blood pressure are being overweight, excessive drinking and smoking, and too much salt in the diet.
“There are also indications that use of oral contracep?tives may contribute to increased blood pressure; however, this is more likely to occur in women who are overweight, whose parents are hypertensive, or who have other hyperten?sive risk factors,” said the editors of Consumer Guide’s “Family Health & Medical Guide.” (Next: Complications of hypertension.)
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Sharon Bell is an avid health and fitness enthusiast and published author. Many of her insightful articles can be found at the premier online news magazine http://www.HealthLinesNews.com
