For years, the question of whether to take medication to lower high blood pressure had been partly answered by a tool that calculated someone's 10-year risk of having a heart attack or stroke. But new equations, which take into account both 10-year and 30-year predicted risk for cardiovascular disease, suggest that even if short-term risk is low, the long-term risk often remains high for some people, according to a study published Monday in the journal Hypertension . "It turns out a lot of people have a low risk for heart attack and stroke over 10 years but a high risk over the next 30 years," said Dr.
Paul Muntner, the study's lead author and a visiting professor at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. "So, our conclusion is that it may be worthwhile for people to understand the risk for both 10 and 30 years when considering whether to start taking medication." Nearly half of U.
S. adults have high blood pressure, also called hypertension, a condition that occurs when the force of blood flowing through a person's arteries is too strong. This can damage the blood vessel walls over time and can lead to heart attack, stroke, heart failure, kidney disease and other health problems.
When the systolic blood pressure, or top number, is 130-139 millimeters of mercury (mmHg) or the diastolic, or bottom number, is 80-89 mmHg, this is stage 1 hypertension. Stage 2 hypertension is diagnosed when the systolic number is 140 mmHg or higher or the diastolic number is 90 mmHg or higher. H.