High blood pressure, also called hypertension, is a serious health problem. It can lead to heart disease, strokes, and other dangerous conditions. It’s like blowing too much air into a balloon—the pressure can make it burst. That’s what high blood pressure does to your blood vessels.
For most people, doctors don’t know exactly why high blood pressure happens. These people usually need to take medicine for the rest of their lives. But now, scientists in the UK have found a new way to help some of them.
Doctors from Queen Mary University of London, Barts Hospital, and Cambridge University Hospital have discovered that small lumps in a hormone gland called the adrenal gland may be to blame. These lumps make too much of a hormone called aldosterone, which raises blood pressure.
This is a big discovery. In about 1 out of every 20 people with high blood pressure, these tiny lumps are the cause. And the good news is that removing them can cure the condition. Some patients are even able to stop taking blood pressure medicine after surgery.
The problem has been that these lumps are very small and hard to find. Until now, doctors used a difficult test that only a few hospitals could do, and it didn’t always work.
That’s where this new method comes in. Doctors have created a better way to find the lumps using a special kind of CT scan and a simple urine test. The scan uses a dye called metomidate that sticks to the lump. It is slightly radioactive, but safe. The dye makes the lump visible for a few minutes on the scan, allowing doctors to find the exact spot.
The study looked at 128 patients with high blood pressure linked to high aldosterone levels. This new scan showed where the problem was in each person. It worked better than the old test, and it helped doctors figure out who could be cured with surgery.
Professor Morris Brown, one of the lead researchers, explained that these lumps are easy to miss with regular scans. But the new scan lights them up, making it clear that they are the problem. Removing the lump can bring blood pressure back to normal.
This discovery solves a mystery that has confused doctors for 60 years. Almost all of these hormone-producing lumps went unnoticed before, but now, with this new method, they can be found and removed.
Professor William Drake, another expert on the team, said the research took years of work and was done by the same team that helped during the COVID-19 pandemic. He believes this new finding will lead to even more important discoveries in the future.
Earlier research by the same group also showed that 5% to 10% of people with high blood pressure have a genetic change in their adrenal glands that causes too much aldosterone. This hormone makes the body hold onto salt, which raises blood pressure and increases the risk of heart problems.
People with too much aldosterone often don’t respond well to regular blood pressure drugs. That’s why this new discovery is so important. It could help many people get better treatment and even a cure.
If you care about high blood pressure, please read studies that early time-restricted eating could help improve blood pressure, and natural coconut sugar could help reduce blood pressure and artery stiffness.
For more health information, please see recent studies about added sugar in your diet linked to higher blood pressure, and results showing vitamin D could improve blood pressure in people with diabetes.
This breakthrough study was published in the journal Nature Medicine.
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