Hypertension in an 18 y.o. female? -

Hi all, I had my blood pressure taken Friday before last at my doctors office at it was inexplicably hitting a massive 160 systolic, despite having been 120/75 when I saw the doctor a week prior and being consistenly measured between 110 and 120 by friends during the week (we re medical students so we practice on each other a lot). This of course sent me into a panic even though my doctor told me the only thing that could make my BP suddenly so high was stress. I monited my BP at home over the past week and it was fluctuating between 135 and 165 systolic, still much higher than it s ever been previously. While practicing with a friend for our clinical exams today it first hit 140/80 and then 150/85 about 10 minutes later. I m under a fair amount of stress at the moment due to fast-approaching exams and some big career path choices which need to be made over the next couple of months, but I don t feel like I m at my most anxious or stressed compared to periods I ve have in the past (though I ve never monitored my BP at these times before). I m really starting to worry that I might have developed hypertension given such consistent high readings over the past couple of weeks. My question is: does anyone think this could be purely stress-related or should I be concerned? I m an 18 y.o. female, fairly overweight but still quite fit and with a low salt diet in otherwise perfect health.

Your blood pressure is perfectly normal, it happens to most patients during a physical check up, I can assure you it will be between 120/80 mm Hg normally. Got luck and stop worrying.

I think it s purely fat related.

160 systolic is not massive.You are not on any medication and yet during certain periods of the day your B.P.is a copy book perfect.Being a medical student you can understand that B.P.is secondary to so many factors.Your reading will be high if you are under mental tension and stress,if reading is taken without 10 minutes rest,different instruments can show a variation error of 5 to 7%,B.P.taken on different arms will be different,lying down or sitting posture will give a different reading,reading taken after meals or before meals will vary and so on and so forth.Being over weight is a contributary factor,Heridity can be another .Since you are over weight it will be worth reducing because a reduction of 10kg.in weight lowers the mercury by 5mm.In my openion you are not hypertensive,but you may be having a tendency.So watch your weight and diet and do regular exercises.

I feel stressed just reading some of the other answers! Mr Physicist is not a medical doctor. I worked for a cardiologist and if is difficult to look at blood pressure the way that he is doing. We find more disease processes every day that blood pressure directly effects. It is now recommended that you try to maintain a pressure less than 135/85. As for causes, Yes, stress can directly contribute to your blood pressure, as you know. If you were able to drop a little weight, it will likely go down as well. The question that I ask all young people with BP issues is, quot;Do you use energy drinks, like Red Bull?quot; Caffeine is a powerful constrictor. Energy drinks are packed with caffeine and/or guaranine (worse than caffeine).

Hi, - Why do you call 160 massive .? Millions of 18 yr olds have systolics of 160 and over. It s not quot;averagequot; but so whatquot;? Everyone s different biologically, and physically, and if there wasn t a range (from low to high) there wouldn t be any quot;averagequot; would there? And what s exactly worrying you? the variations? Well it s the way the system works. If your BP s didn t continuously go up and down (as well as your pulse rate) then your brain and nervous control systems wouldn t be doing their job. What counts is your mean pressure = (Pd + Pp/3).. Yours seems to be about 100 - 107 which is absolutely fine. -Again not average, but I assure you, completely normal. You didn t say what your Pd was when your Ps was 160...? But I ll make a stab at guessing, ........ about 90-ish? This would be because you were stressed in some way, and needed a higher cardiac output, which in turn required a raised mean arterial pressure - perhaps about 113? -It s a guess of course, but am I right? Here s another guess: I think your pulse rate would have risen also to a level roughly equal to the % rise in your mean pressure? So if your relaxed pulse was about 71 bpm, then when your Ps was 160 your pulse should have risen to about 80 bpm? *** Note: -If it didn t that would be unusual, and be cause for some concern and investigation. For someone your age the ratio Pp/N (pulse pressure to pulse rate) would be expected to be roughly 0.5 as compared to that of an elderly sclerotic, perhaps 1? Just two other things you should know: (1) quot;Hypertensionquot; is largely a myth, and you have my assurance you haven t got it, and (2) The readings you obtain by auscultation at the brachial (or any other downstream) artery aren t of course, (-in any sense-) true, That is, while if the readings change over short periods (like those you ve cited as examples) these are fairly accurate reflections of the changes in left-ventricular pressures generated, -BUT they themselves are not in any sense accurate measurements of absolute brachial arterial pressures., So, 160 isn t really the peak pressure in your artery, and neither is 140, nor 120 etc. The true arterial pressures are lots lower. (The same applies to diastolic pressure, Pd, of course... the cuff-pressures are simply not quot;realquot;.) By contrast, the real true pressures on the downstream side of the aortic valve are much HIGHER than the figures you and your fellow-students are getting with your monitors or sphygmo s... quot;It all goes to showquot;, - doesn t it? ______________________________________... If you re at all interested I ll be happy to post a description of how the cardiovascular system really works, and some interesting observations you can make on yourself and colleagues. Such as, ... for instance, quot; If you divide your Mean Arterial Pressure by the product of your pulse rate and pulse pressure, what s the answerquot;?... Well, if you re truly relaxed, the answer is always approximately 0.02.. . ) ** Here s a Homework question for you,..quot;Why.?.quot; That is, - why should it be?The pulse rate varies throughout the day,, your mean pressure varies continuously, and your pulse pressure also goes up and down spectacularly, doesn t it? .. So, .. WHY does (Pm/ N.Pp).... always come out at 0.02? The answer is incredibly important. EDIT: The problem with Katrina s answer is that if you really do quot;keep your BP below 135/85quot;?, as she says, then the numbers simply don t add up .... (and the numbers are the medical profession s , - not mine...) . For instance, If you have (say) 128/80 then mean arterial pressure is 96. But if Pm = 96, and the TPR is 0.02 (your figures, again, -not mine) then from Darcy s Law cardiac out put falls short of the 5 litres per minute your body needs..... and, -of course, the lower your BP is the worse it becomes, -the shortfall becomes greater and greater.... P.S. If I were a doctor, then I d say so. And If I were an imposter, then I d still say I was a doctor, wouldn t I ?.. But I m neither, -I m a Physicist, and very proud of my record. I specialise in the Physics of Cardiovascular Physiology... That s why I get paid so much; it s what I do, and I do it well. I ve no need to pretend I m a doctor.

You say your diet is quot;low saltquot;, but it would have be near zero to be helpful in lowering your blood pressure. The body only needs 200 ms of salt a day but even the American Heart Association recommended amount is 10 times that amount. And most Americans consume twice that, or 4000 mg a day. So, what you think of as quot;lowquot; is probably not low enough. Salt comes into our diets no just as table salt. Many foods--processed meats, snacks, even bread--has salt in it, so you are probably getting more than you know. To lower your blood pressure, avoid foods that raise your blood pressure (salty foods) and eat foods that lower your blood pressure (those high in potassium).