In a recent study from the Hospital Universitari Arnau de Vilanova, scientists found in people with high blood pressure resistant to treatment who also have obstructive sleep apnea (OSA), the more severe their OSA, the higher their blood pressure.
They examined 284 patients, ages 18 to 75, who were treated at hospitals in three countries—Spain, Singapore and Brazil—for resistant high blood pressure.
Among all patients with high blood pressure, those with resistant high blood pressure, which requires three or more drugs to control, are at the greatest risk for a heart attack or other heart disease event.
The team found that 83.5% of patients with resistant hypertension had OSA, including 31.7% with mild OSA, 25.7% with moderate OSA and 31.5% with severe OSA.
OSA was slightly more likely in men than women: 86.3% vs. 76%; however, the men were twice as likely to have severe OSA.
Moreover, as the severity of OSA increased, ambulatory blood pressure increased, particularly at night.
The average nighttime ambulatory blood pressure was 5.72 mmHg higher in those with severe OSA compared to those without OSA.
The team believes that OSA plays an important role in the pathogenesis and prognosis of patients with resistant hypertension.
The finding shows a dose-response association between OSA severity and blood pressure, especially during the nighttime period.
According to the authors, high blood pressure at night is a stronger predictor of cardiovascular risk than those whose blood pressure is high during the day.
Future work needs to directly test if OSA could cause high blood pressure in people with resistant hypertension.
If you care about sleep, please read studies about drugs that could lower severity of sleep apnea by one third, and this herb may help you sleep better at night.
For more information about sleep, please see recent studies about sleep warnings for older men, and results showing this treatment can reduce severity of sleep apnea by one third.
The study was published in the Annals of the American Thoracic Society and conducted by Esther Sapiña-Beltrán et al.
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