By Adadareporters
High blood pressure known as HBP, has been described as one of the diseases that kills silently.
A Medical Doctor with Enugu State University Teaching Hospital Dr Ben made this observation while having an interactive session with Adadareporters
According to him, “It is a silent killer disease that occurs in the heart.
He said that the heart is divided into four chambers, the left and right Atrium and left and right ventricle.
HBP can develop at anytime and most of the time it does not give the person any sign and that is the reason it is called a “silent killer”.
According to him, Sometimes if the person goes for investigation an xray may not capture or reveal it.
“The normal blood pressure should be 100/80 milimitre mercury. When it is above that, the person can be said to be hypertensive.
“It has pre- hypertension and hypertension itself. Pre hypertension if discovered on time can be treated with drugs prescribed by an expert so that it does not escalate to hypertension.
He further said that if a person is suffering from hypertension, the person may not be Carrying his or her daily activities very well.
This is because most often the heart might not be pumping blood on its own to upper and lower ventricle, the person will develop what is called “palpitations” that is breathing fast because the heart is congested.
“It will not be pumping blood very well due to the failure of the heart muscles, by then the blood will not be reaching all the parts of the body, and because of that, blood congested in the heart will develop a kind of problem that will make it distended and when you go for an xray you see a kind of distended vessel.
Asked what causes it, he said that the causes are multifarious.
- “It is genetic” made up of tissue or component that can run in a family just like other diseases that can be inherited.
- Dietary factor like not taking vegetables, too much intake of salt especially raw salt .
- Smoking.
- Excess intake of alcohol.
- Living a sedentary life that is, not exercising ones body, obesity and others.
“The disease cannot be cured, but It can be managed. One of the ways of managing it according to him, is by going for regular check up, meeting an expert who can prescribe drugs.
Others are: Eating of balance diet, less intake of salt, stop smoking and drink less quantity of alcohol if possible, stop it entirely.
