Beaney T, et al. - In view of the notion that elevated blood pressure is the greatest contributor to the worldwide burden of disease and mortality, researchers expanded World Hypertension Day to become May Measurement Month (MMM) — a month of standardized global blood pressure measurement and data collection — as a pragmatic and rapid approach to addressing the problem of insufficient awareness of hypertension. They recognized MMM 2017 as the largest synchronized, standardized multinational screening campaign of any cardiovascular risk factor performed to date. Observations suggest that using volunteers and convenience sampling, inexpensive global screening of blood pressure is achievable.

Methods

• Volunteer adults ( ≥ 18 years) who preferably had not had their blood pressures measured in the past year were involved in this cross-sectional survey.
• Researchers measured blood pressure three times in each participant and administered a questionnaire about demographic, lifestyle, and environmental factors.
• Raising awareness of blood pressure, measured by number of countries involved, number of people screened, and number of people who have untreated or inadequately treated hypertension (defined as systolic blood pressure ≥ 140 mm Hg or diastolic blood pressure ≥ 90 mm Hg, or both, or based on receiving antihypertensive medication) was the primary objective of this work.

Results

• From 1,201,570 individuals in 80 countries, researchers obtained data.
• Of the 1,128,635 individuals for whom a mean of the second and third readings was available, 393,924 (34.9%) individuals had hypertension.
• Researchers recognized 888,616 individuals who were not receiving antihypertensive treatment, of these 153,905 (17.3%) were hypertensive.
• Treatment was received by 227,721 individuals; of these, 105,456 (46.3%) did not have controlled blood pressure.
• Regions showed significant differences in terms of adjusted blood pressures and hypertension incidence.
• In association with antihypertensive medication, diabetes, cerebrovascular disease, smoking, and alcohol consumption, higher adjusted blood pressure was noted.
• Blood pressure measured on the right arm vs that on the left arm was higher; blood pressure was highest on Saturdays.