EDUCATION IN HEART

Hypertension

Cardiac and vascular pathophysiology in hypertension

Jamil Mayet, Alun Hughes

International Centre for Circulatory Health, 10th Floor QEQM Wing, St Mary’s Hospital, and Imperial College Paddington and Clinical Pharmacology, NHLI, Imperial College of Science, Technology & Medicine, London, UK

Correspondence to:
Correspondence to:
Professor Alun Hughes, International Centre for Circulatory Health, 10th Floor, QEQM Wing, St Mary’s Hospital and Imperial College, Paddington, London W2 1NY, UK;
a.hughes@imperial.ac.uk

Keywords: hypertension; pathophysiology; peripheral vascular resistance

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

Hypertension is one the earliest recorded medical conditions (Nei Jin by Huang Ti around 2600BC); it has shaped the course of modern history¹ and the consequences of hypertension (myocardial infarction, strokes, and heart failure) will soon be the leading global cause of death. Nevertheless, despite intensive research, the aetiology of hypertension remains obscure; only around 5% of cases have an identifiable cause.² Indeed, primary or essential hypertension is perhaps better not considered a disease at all,^w1 rather (as suggested by Sir Geoffrey Rose) a level of blood pressure above which treatment does more good than harm. An individual’s blood pressure depends on the complex interplay of heart and blood vessels and understanding this relation is the key to understanding the pathophysiology of hypertension.

NORMAL CARDIAC AND VASCULAR PHYSIOLOGY

The role of the circulation is to deliver blood to the tissues and flow occurs because of the pressure difference established by the pumping action of . . . [Full text of this article]

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