Hypertension. Common word and common disease.High blood pressure is hypertension, every body knows that.

[patliputra]

The question is what is blood pressure, what is normal BP. How high is hypertension ? Are there any causes ? Any complication of high BP?

[patliputra]

The pressure of blood on arterialwall is blood pressure. This pressure is maximum when heart is pumping the blood.it is called systolic pressure.when heart is in relaxing phase the pressure on arterial wall is minimal called diastolic pressure . It thr minimum constant pressure that arteries have to bear.

Normal blood pressure is arbitraly fixed at systolic less than 120 and diastolic less than 80.

Hypertension is called when systolic and diastolic pressure is more than 140 and 90 respectively.

Generally two types of blood pressure is recognised. Majority suffer from ESSENTIAL hypertension where cause is not known. Other form is SECONDARY hypertension where cause is known.

Hypertension causes several complications which in nutshell include heart attack, heart failure, stroke, thickening of blood vessels,kidney disease etc.