High Blood Pressure and Kidney Disease

Many people are not aware that blood pressure is closely related to kidney health. High blood pressure, or hypertension, can damage the kidneys. And because the kidneys have a major role in keeping blood pressure at healthy levels, if they are damaged your blood pressure can become even higher.

High blood pressure makes the heart work harder and, over time, can damage blood vessels throughout the body. If the blood vessels in the kidneys are damaged, they may stop doing their job of removing waste and extra fluid from the blood. The extra fluid may then raise blood pressure even more.

High blood pressure is the second leading cause of kidney failure (after diabetes). Patients with kidney failure, also called end-stage renal disease (ESRD), must either go on dialysis or receive a new kidney through a transplant. Every year, high blood pressure causes more than 15,000 new cases of ESRD in the United States.

Most people with high blood pressure do not have any symptoms. The only way to know if your blood pressure is high is to have it measured by a health professional. The measurement consists of two numbers that show the pressure when your heart is beating (the top number) and when it is resting between beats (the bottom number). A person's blood pressure is usually considered high if it is 140/90 or higher.

African-Americans are more likely than Caucasians to have high blood pressure and to develop kidney problems from it, even when blood pressure is only mildly elevated. In fact, African-Americans aged 25 to 44 are 20 times more likely than their white counterparts to develop hypertension-related kidney failure. The National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases, part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), is sponsoring studies to find effective ways to prevent hypertension-related ESRD in African-Americans.

The National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, also part of NIH, has found that four behaviors can go a long way toward helping to maintain healthy blood pressure:

• Control your weight.
• Limit your sodium intake.
• Get plenty of exercise.
• Avoid excessive alcohol consumption.

Many people need medication to control high blood pressure. A group of medications called ACE inhibitors lower blood pressure and can also help protect kidney functions in diabetic patients. If you have high blood pressure, see your doctor regularly.

This article includes information from the National Institutes of Health.

Each year, Medical College of Wisconsin physicians care for more than 180,000 patients, representing nearly 500,000 patient visits. Medical College physicians practice at Children's Hospital of Wisconsin, Froedtert Memorial Lutheran Hospital, the Milwaukee VA Medical Center, and many other hospitals and clinics in Milwaukee and southeastern Wisconsin.