Why do people have high blood pressure?
Friday, September 17th, 2010 at
5:00 pm
Quote High blood pressure basically means there is a high peripheral resistance to blood flow when the heart pumps. In terms of blood pressure, it is the diastolic that is usually of more concern (ie the bottom number). This can be for several reasons: Quote
Can some one explain the above better ?
Filed under: Diseases And Conditions
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There are many causes of high blood pressure / hypertension.
such as kidney, vascular, endocrine and other underlying causes. This accounts for only 5% of cases. Primary hypertension accounts for the other 95% and is where a specific underlying cause cannot be found.
Basically hypertension is divided into two main categories: Essential or Primary and Secondary. Secondary hypertension is that caused by a secondary cause
It is speculated that for primary hypertension the underlying risk factors are multifactorial, meaning there are a varied number of factors. One of the main risk factors is underlying atheroscleorsis where basically you have thickening of the lining of the arteries o the body (usually medium to large sized arteries). In light of this, ho i like to explain it, is like picturing a water pipe in your house. Normally, when it is brand new, the pressure in it is ‘normal’, like in our body, the average ‘pressure’ in our ‘piping’ should be around 120 over 80 (120/80). With time, because of all the impurities in the water such as the calcium chloride (the white stuff you might sometimes see in water), these impurities beging to ‘line’ the wall of the pipes. In our body, because of the high ‘fat’ (cholesterol) and other factors, the ‘fat’ deposits on the lining of our ‘piping’. With time, our ‘piping’ becomes thickened and the lining becomes raggedy. The blood will therefore find it harder to push through the ‘piping’. Because it is pushing so hard, the pressure slowly but surely builds up allowing the heart to pump at higher pressures to push the blood around the body.
Think of it like water pipes (say in your sink…). Normally the water flows right through them, no problem. If you have high blood pressure it is as if you pipes have become more narrow, so the same amount of fluid takes more pressure to flow through the pipes. This means that when your heart pumps it is pumping harder to push the blood through smaller pipes (pumping against resistance). This can lead to your heart becoming enlarged (your heart is a muscle, so you just like if you pump iron in the gym and your biceps get bigger, when your heart works harder it gets bigger). Diastolic is the time when you heart is relaxing and refilling with blood (systolic is when your heart contracts). Hope that helps a little bit. If you have concerns about your BP see your doctor, they can give you meds to help prevent problems from high BP.
your quote isn’t accurate, peripheral resistance isn’t the only cause of high blood pressure, it isn’t even a primary cause. But what the quote is saying means that high blood pressure is due to hardening of the arteries, making it more difficult for the heart to push the blood thru them. It goes on to say that the diastolic is more important, that is the pressure of the blood between beats of the heart…. and that isn’t necessarily true either.
You looking at an older text book or something?
High peripheral resistance to blood flow just means that the blood vessels in the body are constricted (tighter, smaller radius). When blood vessels are constricted, blood has to be pumped even harder than it is being pumped in a normal individual because the body is trying to keep blood levels to and from the heart normal. So the pressure of the blood in the vessels is HIGH because it’s trying hard to pump the blood.
There’s systolic and diastolic pressure. Systolic is the number on the top of your blood pressure reading and Diastolic is the number on the bottom–> [120/80 is normal]