High Diastolic Blood Pressure
Every time your heart beats, blood is released from your heart and spread throughout your body via the blood vessels (arteries, capillaries and veins are types of blood vessels). Blood pressure is the force of this blood pushing against the walls of the arteries.
Your blood pressure is at its highest when the heart beats, forcing blood into the arteries. This is called systolic pressure. When the heart is at rest, between beats, your blood pressure falls. This is the diastolic pressure. Blood pressure is always given as two numbers, the systolic and diastolic pressures. Both are important. The systolic pressure is the first or top number, and the diastolic pressure is the second or bottom number (for example, 120/80). If your blood pressure is 120/80, you say that it is "120 over 80".
Both of these numbers do not need to be high for you to have high blood pressure. Either one or both can be high for you to have high blood pressure.
A high diastolic blood pressure has been and remains, especially for younger people, an important hypertension number.
Research has shown that a high diastolic blood pressure is a significant risk factor for heart attacks, strokes, kidney failure, and other serious conditions.
For older people, especially after the age of 55, the diastolic pressure will naturally begin to decrease, while the systolic blood pressure usually begins to rise and becomes more important.
Your physician will use both the systolic and the diastolic blood pressure to determine your blood pressure category and appropriate prevention and treatment activities. One high diastolic blood pressure reading does not necessarily mean you have high blood pressure. There are numerous factors that can temporarily and artificially raise blood pressure, including the stress of being in a medical setting. This is why a good physician will want to keep an ongoing record of your blood pressure readings ... to be able to detect a pattern and not just a temporary blimp.
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