The Punjab capital city has marked the World Hypertension Day-2016 with a theme "know your blood pressure" to continue efforts to promote healthy lifestyle and awareness against diseases. Since high blood pressure causes various complications in the body and may lead to the major risk to the heart, stroke, kidney disease, eye disorders, coma or even death, there is need to sensitise people about the disease.
Estimates claim around three out of 10 people are suffering from hypertension world-wide. About 1.8 billion of the people globally are suffering from hypertension and the most surprise thing is 50 per cent of them are totally unaware of their condition and some of them who are aware of their condition do not take any medical action for their blood pressure.
To mark the day, organisations arranged medical camps, symposium, scientific sessions and seminars. Health professionals have raised concerns over increasing trend among youths, including girls of smoking sheesha and also asked people to modify their lifestyle to lessen chances of smoking and hypertension that lead to heart attack. They sais hypertension and smoking has identical repercussions while women smokers have to go for abortion.
A study shows that when people quit smoking, they have better blood flow in three months, in nine months their symptoms of asthma improves and in five years the threat of heart attack is almost over. "Such a modification in life is essential now," they said. At the Shalamar Hospital in Lahore, a medical camp was arranged in OPD-1 where patients are being tested for blood sugar and cholesterol for free.
Doctor Javed Ashraf, the Associate Professor of Cardiology delivered a lecture on hypertension, its causes, treatment and control options, saying high blood pressure was the leading cause of heart diseases. "The prevalence of essential hypertension is alarmingly increasing in Pakistani population despite of the demographics being of lower BMI and nutrition," he said.
Other speakers said the factors peculiar to Pakistan were increased genetic susceptibility, environmental factors such as gender, female gender, urbanisation, obesity and sedentary life styles particularly in middle age, cultural practices promoting sedentary life style in female. A study said in the urban population the hypertension prevalence was higher than rural population and higher in females in both urban and rural populations. The effect of environmental factors is a major contributor to prevalence of hypertension.
The health professionals said a steep rise in prevalence rate of hypertension "in our population can be explained by change in the life styles of middle age more pronounced in the female". "Obesity, increased to alarming proportions, particularly in urban population, although it was significantly present in rural population as well. Female gender, genetic predisposition, urbanisation, obesity, smoking in men, cultural factors in women and sedentary life styles have been identified as the factors accelerating the prevalence of hypertension in Pakistani population," they added.