STATISTICAL ANALYSIS OF REPORTED CASES OF HYPERTENSION

STATISTICAL ANALYSIS OF REPORTED CASES OF HYPERTENSION (A CASE STUDY OF UNIVERSITY OF UYO TEACHNIG HOSPITAL, UYO)

CHAPTER ONE

GENERAL INTRODUCTION

Hypertension has become a major public health problem over the world because it may cause serious damage to body organs and induce cerebrovascullar accident, coronanry heart disease, heart failure, renal failure and other complications. Scientific research demonstrated that essential hypertension is the multifactor disease co-determined by the genetic predisposition, and environmental factors. The physical examination centre is the important sector for screening of hypertension. Hypertension is a serious and dangerous disease that needs treatment, because constant high blood pressure affects the organism badly for example, the work of many organs, like heart and kidney.

Hypertension can be caused by the long-lasting consumption of biologically active medicine. The brightest example of such medicine is oral contraception. When women consume this medicine, they will probably have hypertension soon, then the impacts of oral contraception from obesity and the ones who smoke heavily. The best way to cure the disease is to combine medical treatment with the modification of the lifestyle.

There are many causes of hypertension so it is multifactorial. Adrenerdic activity through beta receptor stimulation increase the heart rate and through alpha-receptor stimulation increase peripheral arteriolar constriction and this can elevate the blood pressure damage of the inner linnining of the arterioles release a vasoconstriction polypeptide endothelin which causes arteriolar constriction eventually a sustained blood pressure (BP) rise and leakage of micro albuminuria. Hypertension is the term used to describe high blood pressure (HBP). Throughout this work, the words hypertension and high blood pressure will be used interchangeably.