High diastolic blood pressure is a relatively rare form of hypertension. It occurs when there is a rise only in the diastolic measurement of your blood pressure.  The systolic measurement, the first one the doctor mentions, would remain within normal range.  But what is blood pressure and how is it measured? 

When talking about blood pressure, everyone knows about the cuffs used in school or the doctors office that are placed around the bicep and pumped full of air and many people as children remember playing with the blood pressure machines at the pharmacy or grocery store as their parents pick up a prescription. But what exactly is high blood pressure and how can it affect you?

Blood pressure is measured in millimeters of mercury. The number or pressure is followed by mmHg which simply translates to millimeters, Mercury. There will always be two numbers of which the first is known as systolic pressure and is the pressure in your arteries at the moment of the heart’s contraction while the other number, diastolic is the exact opposite in which it is the pressure in the arteries in between the heart’s contractions.

High blood pressure can actually come in three forms and while many people are only accustomed to one, it is possible that you too could have high blood pressure without realizing it. The first form of high blood pressure is when your systolic blood pressure is too high. This is usually seen as like 170/70. Since the first number is the systolic and having high blood pressure is anything over 140 for systolic and 90 for diastolic, therefore it is completely possible for only your systolic pressure to be too high which is still classified as having high blood pressure.

It is also possible for your diastolic pressure to be high and your systolic pressure to be normal. In a case like this, you may see something like 120/104 for your blood pressure. This is still high blood pressure and can be potentially dangerous if it is like this every time you have your pressure taken.

The third and most well known form of high blood pressure is when both the systolic and the diastolic pressures are just too high. Furthermore, medications that are available are designed to treat either a high diastolic or a high systolic blood pressure and in the event that you have both, then chances are that you may be prescribed two different medications to help keep your blood pressure lower.

While high blood pressure is constituted as being 140/90 mmHg, it is also dangerous if you classify as having what is called mild blood pressure. Usually people who have high blood pressure started with mild blood pressure and therefore catching it in this stage is very important to helping stop it. Like many other conditions, the sooner it can be discovered and treated, the better outcome potential that there will be.

Tags: causes of high blood pressure, causes of hypertension, high diastolic blood pressure

This entry was posted on Wednesday, January 21st, 2009 at 11:15 pm and is filed under Types of Hypertension. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.