Trabajo de Inglés. Hypertension, a dangerous enemy

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Out-Class

Work

Theme: Hypertension, a dangerous enemy.

Members: Aliubis Herrera Carballosa

                 Eleonora Martínez Columbié

                 Gabriela Rodríguez Bauta[pic 1]

Group: 3

Course: 2022-2023

Introduction

Arterial hypertension (HTN) is the most frequent of the conditions that worsen the health of adults in all parts of the world. The lack of symptoms that they produce in their initial stages, together with the damage in most of the organs and systems of the body, have given them the qualification of "silent enemy or murderer".

The history of blood pressure begins when someone abandons the concept of the heart as the center of emotions and conceives of it as a pump that pumps blood. To arrive at the concept of hypertension, it was necessary to be aware that blood pressure is a variable, like breathing, heart rate or temperature, and that some people have higher blood pressure than others, from which it follows that They are then at greater risk of becoming ill or dying. For this to be known, a device had to be invented to measure it.

Blood pressure is the force exerted by the blood against the walls of the arteries. In that sense, every time the heart beats, it pumps blood into the arteries, which is when its pressure is highest and this is called systolic pressure. When the heart is at rest between beats, blood pressure decreases, then it is called diastolic pressure. Both the systolic and diastolic numbers are used in the blood pressure reading. In general, the systolic is mentioned first or above the diastolic.1

Cardiovascular diseases are responsible for approximately 17 million deaths a year worldwide, almost a third of the total. Among them, the complications of high blood pressure cause 9.4 million deaths annually.

The diagnosis of hypertension is made through regular blood pressure measurements, a non-invasive method that is easy to perform in health areas and homes, and that can be carried out by untrained health personnel. Hypertension is more common in sedentary people such as office workers, doctors, and others with excess body fat, and in certain families, its prevalence also increases with aging. The vast majority of hypertensive patients have primary or essential hypertension of multifactorial and imprecise origin. Another small number of cases (5-10%) suffer from hypertension due to known secondary causes, mainly renal.

There are an estimated 1.28 billion adults aged 30 to 79 years with hypertension worldwide, most of whom (about two-thirds) live in low- and middle-income countries. According to estimates, 46% of hypertensive adults are unaware that they will develop this condition.1

In Cuba, this disease has a high prevalence, which fluctuates between 20-32% in people over 15 years of age, that is, around 2 million affected; however, the report from the Ministry of Public Health on the dispensarization of hypertensive patients showed that only 8.6% of the adult population was found under this active method of control, far from the demonstrated prevalence. Presumably, a large number of people are not notified, since many of them do not receive treatment and many others are not controlled.2

Scientific problem: What are the clinical characteristics of arterial hypertension as a chronic disease?

Objective

Characterize arterial hypertension taking into account the clinical picture, risk factors, treatment and prevention.

Method

A descriptive study was carried out regarding the clinical characteristics of hypertension as a chronic disease.

Development

Risk factors for high blood pressure

Although the specific causes of high blood pressure are not yet known, it has been related to a number of factors that are usually present in most people who suffer from it, such as: a diet high in salt, fat or cholesterol , in addition to chronic conditions (renal and hormonal problems, diabetes mellitus and high cholesterol), family history of the disease, lack of physical activity, old age (the older the person, the more likely they are to suffer from it), overweight, obesity, color of the skin, some contraceptive medications, stress and excessive consumption of tobacco or alcohol.2

Clinical picture

In the majority of patients, arterial hypertension occurs without symptoms and, therefore, goes unnoticed, with the risk that this entails, but there are clinical manifestations such as headache, sweating, rapid pulse, shortness of breath, dizziness, visual disturbances, buzzing in the the ears, facial flushing and eye spots as flying dark objects.

According to data from the Spanish Society of Arterial Hypertension-Spanish League for the Fight against Arterial Hypertension, hypertensive patients who have been undiagnosed for a long time may suffer a complication at a given moment, such as angina pectoris, which is a symptom derived from this.

The excess pressure in the arteries maintained for years and not treated, can lead to a high number of complications such as atherosclerosis, hypertensive heart disease, kidney disease and stroke.1

Treatment

The goal of treatment is to decrease cardiovascular morbidity and mortality. This is achieved by normalizing blood pressure and controlling other cardiovascular risk factors, without causing other physical, mental or social illnesses.

If the patient presents risk factors such as hypercholesterolemia, smoking, obesity, diabetes mellitus and a sedentary lifestyle, then it is necessary to correct them if cardiovascular risk is to be significantly reduced.

The fundamental premise to treat patients with arterial hypertension must be to individualize the treatment. In some cases, the normalization of blood pressure is obtained only by modifying the lifestyle; in others, it is necessary to indicate drug therapy, but in both situations, patient education is essential. The most important impediment to achieving the proposed objective is non-compliance with the therapeutic plan indicated by the physician.3

Non-pharmacological treatment: lifestyle modifications

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