“Know your numbers” call to patients amid hidden blood pressure risk

As many as 100,000 people in Bedfordshire, Luton and Milton Keynes could be living with undiagnosed high blood pressure, potentially putting them at risk of heart attacks, strokes, kidney disease and vascular dementia.

That’s the stark fact behind Know Your Numbers Week, a campaign to encourage everybody to get their blood pressure checked.

High blood pressure is known as a silent killer, because very often it has no symptoms.  You may be at higher risk if you’re overweight, you have an unhealthy diet – especially one which contains too much salt – or you smoke, or drink too much alcohol.  But there are other risk factors which you can’t change: for example, you’re at higher risk if you’re older, or you come from a Black African, Black Caribbean or South Asian background.

At one event this summer – HealthFest in Luton – NHS staff that found 18% of people who came forward for testing had high blood pressure, suggesting that the local prevalence could be even higher than the estimate.

Dr Andrew Rochford, chief medical officer at Bedfordshire, Luton and Milton Keynes Integrated Care Board, said:

“Across the UK, there could be as many as five million people who have high blood pressure, but they don’t know it.  That means that locally, as many as 100,000 people could be living with this silent killer.

“If your blood pressure is too high, you’re more at risk of some serious health conditions, but there’s plenty you can do to reduce it: either simple lifestyle changes, or medication to reduce your blood pressure if it’s very high.

“Knowing your numbers is the first step in taking control over your heart health.  But it’s easy to know your numbers: many pharmacies offer a free blood pressure check to people over 40, or you might want to buy a monitor which you can use in your own home: they are usually battery-powered and often cost only a few pounds.

“There’s more advice on high blood pressure, as well as many other health conditions, on the NHS website.”