Wednesday 10 August 2016

Low income countries overtake high income countries in hypertension prevalence

Low income countries overtake high income countries in hypertension prevalence Global disparities in hypertension prevalence and control are large and increasing and the prevalence of high blood pressure is higher in low- and middle-income countries than in the high income countries, according to the first systematic analysis of global health disparities in hypertension prevalence, awareness, treatment, and control. The greatest increases in absolute burden of hypertension were observed in East Asia and Pacific, South Asia, and sub-Saharan Africa. · In 2010, 31.1% of the world’s adults had hypertension; of these, 28.5% in high-income countries, while 31.5% were in the low- and middle-income countries. · An estimated 1.39 billion people had hypertension in 2010. And 1.04 billion of these were living in the low- and middle-income countries as compared with 349 million in high-income countries. · The prevalence of hypertension decreased by 2.6% in high-income countries but increased by 7.7% in low- and middle-income countries from 2000 to 2010. The analysis also observed considerable differences in the level of awareness and treatment of hypertension. While, awareness, treatment, and control of hypertension increased considerably in high-income countries, low- and middle-income countries showed much less improvement. The study identified many barriers to effective treatment and control of hypertension in the poorer parts of the world such as lack of access to care, costly medications, overburdened healthcare providers, lack of treatment guideline adherence, low patient health literacy and adverse side effects A total of 135 population-based studies of 968,419 adults from 90 countries were included in the analysis published August 9, 2016 in the journal Circulation.

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