What to ask your doctor about high blood pressure; Hypertension - what to ask your doctor
When your heart pumps blood into your arteries, the pressure of the blood against the artery walls is called your blood pressure. Your blood pressure is given as two numbers: systolic over diastolic blood pressure. Your systolic blood pressure is the highest blood pressure during the course of your heart beat cycle. Your diastolic blood pressure is the lowest pressure.
When your blood pressure gets too high, it puts extra stress on your heart and blood vessels. If your blood pressure stays high all the time, you will be at a higher risk for heart attacks and other vascular (blood vessel) diseases, strokes, kidney disease, and other health problems.
Below are questions you may want to ask your health care provider to help you take care of your blood pressure.
How can I change the way I live to lower my blood pressure?
Should I check my blood pressure at home?
What is my cholesterol? Do I need to take medicines for it?
Is it OK to be sexually active? Is it safe to use sildenafil (Viagra), vardenafil (Levitra), or tadalafil (Cialis), or avanafil (Stendra) for erection problems?
What medicines am I taking to treat high blood pressure?
How much activity can I do?
Bakris GL, Sorrentino MJ. Systemic hypertension: mechanisms, diagnosis, and treatment. In: Libby P, Bonow RO, Mann DL, Tomaselli GF, Bhatt DL, Solomon SD, eds. Braunwald's Heart Disease: A Textbook of Cardiovascular Medicine.12th ed. Philadelphia, PA: Elsevier; 2022:chap 26.
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention website. High blood pressure. www.cdc.gov/bloodpressure/index.htm. Updated March 14, 2023. Accessed March 22, 2023.
Whelton PK, Carey RM, Aronow WS, et al. 2017 ACC/AHA/AAPA/ABC/ACPM/AGS/APhA/ASH/ASPC/NMA/PCNA guideline for the prevention, detection, evaluation, and management of high blood pressure in adults: a report of the American College of Cardiology/American Heart Association Task Force on Clinical Practice Guidelines. J Am Coll Cardiol. 2018; 71(19)e127-e248. PMID: 29146535 pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/29146535/.
BACK TO TOPReview Date: 3/2/2023
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