Hypertension camp finds many unaware of condition

At a hypertension screening camp conducted by a private hospital on Tuesday, doctors were startled: a lot of young people were found to have high blood pressure, and at least half of those who were hypertensive did not know they had the condition.

To mark World Hypertension Day, which fell on May 17, Global Health City held a screening camp among their outpatients and some inpatients, at a corporate and at a school, testing over 2,400 people, said Arun Dhanasekar, senior interventional cardiologist at the hospital.

“We found that nearly 20 per cent of the people we screened had a blood pressure that was higher than 140/90 mm Hg, which was our cut-off limit. We had the patients sit, relax for about 10 minutes and then tested in order to avoid discrepancies,” he said. Normal blood pressure is considered to be 120/80 mm Hg.

While some people had alarmingly high levels of blood pressure, what was startling was that at least 50 per cent of those who had hypertension had no idea they’d had it, said Dr. Dhanasekar. “Many of our patients were young and had just wanted to get tested. They were very concerned when they found out they had this,” he said.

Hypertension is considered a silent killer, one that can affect several organs if undiagnosed. “Hypertension is considered one of the five causes of a heart attack. If unchecked, it can cause heart failure. I get many young patients coming in with breathlessness who are found to have high blood pressure,” he said.

The condition also is one of the major risk factors for strokes and can also lead to kidney disease.

One way to reduce blood pressure is to reduce your sodium intake, said Dr. Dhanasekar. “A lot of people think just reducing the salt they consume will solve the problem. But salt is just one of the sources of sodium. A lot of packaged food contains it, as it is used as a preservative so people should be careful about that,” he said.

The World Health Organisation recommends only 5 grams of salt per day. Children below the age of 16 need even less. However, most Indians are believed to consume between 10 to 15 grams a day, putting them at risk of hypertension.