NatureMed

Preventing Cardiovascular Disease in Men:

Prehypertension and Hypertension- Effective Evidence-Based Naturopathic Treatment

Being male puts a patient at increased risk of getting cardiovascular disease (CVD) mostly because men get CVD approximately 10 years earlier then women. Increased risk begins at 55 for men and 65 for women. Hormonal factors are hypothesized to be responsible for this difference in risk. Overall risk of hypertension does differ appreciably between men and women. Because hypertension is an important modifiable risk factor one could argue that aggressive early detection and treatment in the male population could help to delay the progression of CVD.

The purpose of this article is to discuss the classification of prehypertension and hypertension and discuss how early detection and naturopathic treatment may delay the progression of CVD. Exercise is a well-known key component of therapeutic lifestyle changes but will not be discussed here due to space limitations.

In 2003 the National Institutes of Health came out with the new classification called prehypertension. Prehypertension is also an independent risk factor because it is closely correlated with risk of developing stage 1 and 2 hypertension. Patients with prehypertension also tend to have more CVD risk factors than in normotensive individuals.  Thus, patients with prehypertension are considered an ideal group for early intervention.
An estimated 70 million American adults have prehypertension, a blood pressure (BP) classification adopted in 2003 by Seventh Joint National Committee on the Prevention, Detection, Evaluation, and Treatment of Hypertension (JNC7). Prehypertension describes a range of BP levels that had previously been categorized as normal or borderline: 120-139 mm Hg systolic and/or 80-89 mm Hg diastolic (see table 1).

JNC6 Classification
(1997)

Blood Pressure
(mm Hg)
JNC7 Classification
(2003)
Optimal
<120/80
Normal
Normal
120-129/80-84
Prehypertension
Borderline
130-139/85-89