The successful drive to identify and treat high blood pressure in England has saved tens of thousands of lives every year, researchers say today.
Extensive treatment has led to average blood pressure levels falling – while the proportion of affected adults receiving treatment has increased massively in the last 20 years, according to the study.
The study is due to be reported to a major conference on blood pressure in Athens, Greece, next month and is reported in The Lancet today.
Researchers say the continuing rate of progress could prevent an extra 50,000 illnesses of the circulation by 2022 – that is strokes, heart attacks and deaths.
Researcher Emanuela Falaschetti, from Imperial College, London, UK, said: "As a result of these improvements in practice, several hundreds of thousands of major cardiovascular events might have been prevented.”
The researchers say that by 2011 58% of patients with high blood pressure were receiving treatment – and 63% were successfully keeping the problem under control.
* A second study in the journal identifies different effects on health from increases in the high point and the low points of blood pressure readings – systolic and diastolic blood pressure.
Researchers say there is strong link between high systolic blood pressure and risk of stable angina together with strokes caused by haemorrhage. Diastolic blood pressure is linked to risk of abdominal aortic aneurysm, they say.
Researcher Dr Eleni Rapsomaniki, from The Farr Institute for Health Informatics Research, London, UK, said: "Our findings do not support the widely held assumptions that systolic and diastolic pressure have similar strong associations with the occurrence of all cardiovascular diseases across a wide age range."
Hypertension management in England: a serial cross-sectional study from 1994 to 2011. Lancet 30 May 2014; 383: 1912–19 [abstract]
Blood pressure and incidence of twelve cardiovascular diseases: lifetime risks, healthy life-years lost, and age-specific associations in 1·25 million people. Lancet 30 May 2014; 383: 1899–911 [abstract]
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