Dangerously high blood pressure hospitalizations more than doubled in 20 years

By Tom Campbell via SWNS

The number of people taken to hospital because their blood pressure is dangerously high has more than doubled over the past 20 years, according to a new study.

Men face greater odds of being hospitalized because of their blood pressure - but women could be more likely to die, suggest the findings.

If a person's blood pressure rises above a certain point, known as hypertension, they could suffer a heart attack or stroke.

Overall progress in controlling people's blood pressure has been reported by some studies, but it appears they may have spoken too soon.

First author Dr. Joseph Ebinger at the Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in California said: "Although more people have been able to manage their blood pressure over the last few years, we’re not seeing this improvement translate into fewer hospitalizations for hypertensive crises."

Data on hospitalizations in the United States from the National Inpatient Sample, a publicly available database, was analyzed by the researchers.

They found annual hospitalizations for hypertensive crises - when blood pressure reaches dangerously high levels, more than doubled over a 13-year period.

They represented 0.17 percent of all hospital admissions for men in 2002, compared to 0.39 percent in 2014.

Women also saw an increase in the number of blood pressure related hospitalizations during this period, from 0.16 percent to 0.34 percent.

A number of factors could explain why more and more people are ending up in hospital with dangerously high blood pressure, the researchers say.

For starters, many people cannot afford blood pressure medication, especially in countries like the US where healthcare often comes at a premium.

Alternatively, people may see their blood pressure rise because they are not taking the right dose of medication.

Socio-economic factors could also make it difficult for some people to avoid unhealthy behaviors like high-salt diets, inactivity and smoking which contribute to hypertension.

Dr. Ebinger said: “We need more research to understand why this is happening and how clinicians can help patients stay out of the hospital."

Overall, high blood pressure resulted in 918,392 hospitalizations and 4,377 in-hospital deaths, although the risk of death did slightly decrease over time.

Women died at the same rate as men despite experiencing fewer health issues, the researchers also found.

Senior author Dr. Susan Cheng said: "These findings raise the question: Are there sex-specific biologic mechanisms that place women at greater risk for dying during a hypertensive crisis?

"By understanding these processes, we could prevent more deaths among women."

The findings were published in the Journal of the American Heart Association.