But if you're 60 or older, the target has moved up: Your goal is to keep your blood pressure at 150/90 or lower. The new guidelines change nothing if you're younger than 60. (The top number represents the pressure inside the arteries when the heart beats, and the bottom number is the pressure between beats, when the heart rests.) Guidelines from the previous panel in 2003 defined high blood pressure in older adults as 140/90 or above, meaning that's the threshold for taking medication to bring those numbers down. This is not the time to loosen control over blood pressure," says the group's president, Mariell Jessup, M.D., medical director of the University of Pennsylvania's heart and vascular center. "Hypertension is such a strong risk factor, especially if you have other diseases. The American Heart Association has also resisted the change, saying that it could undermine recent progress in reducing deaths from these conditions. However, five panel members disagreed and published a follow-up article in the Annals of Internal Medicine warning that the change could put more patients at risk for heart disease and stroke.ĭo you think it's okay to change these guidelines? Join the discussion Its findings were published in the Journal of the American Medical Association. The controversy began when a panel of 17 national experts announced in December that, based on a five-year analysis of the best available research, the target for treating high blood pressure should be nudged a little higher for those age 60-plus and for those with diabetes or kidney disease. The result has been confusion similar to that created late last year with the muddled rollout of new guidelines for using cholesterol-lowering statin drugs. New blood pressure guidelines could be dangerous for some.Įn español l It sounded like great news for thousands of older people: New blood pressure guidelines might free them from the anxiety of taking powerful medications to control their blood pressure, and the side effects those pills sometimes brought.īut almost immediately, several members of the panel of medical experts recommending the change strongly dissented and warned that the new guidelines could endanger some people.
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