My daughter was at a store the other day, and she checked her blood pressure on one of those machines by the pharmacy. Her blood pressure was a bit high, and it said the word "pre-hypertension."
My daughter is 13 years old and overweight.
Could you tell me what it means? It means she is borderline. She is at a high risk for developing hypertension. Take her to her doctor so he can monitor it. My brother is borderline as well. He was diagnosed with it at around 13-14 and he's overweight as well. If she had just eaten something especially with salt or cheese that could cause it to go high as well. Take her to the doctor after she's ate at least an hour after she's eaten and see if she's still borderline. He'll probably give her a no sodium (salt) diet to help keep it down. You can't diagnose or "label" someone with hypertension (or prehypertension) with one abnormal reading! Not to mention, more than half of those store BP machines are inaccurate because they are not serviced or calibrated. You might want to consider purchasing an individual BP monitor at the drug store and take her BP consistantly for few weeks (three times a day, at the same time each day). If she is consistantly higher than normal, you might want to have her further evaluated by her doctor. It never hurts to have her limit her intake of salty foods (anything canned, fried, processed) and start her on a light exercise program (walking) if she is not already doing one. Also, if high blood pressure runs in the family, you want to be more aggressive in your approach to making some changes in her lifestyle habits. Good luck. Untreated chronic high blood pressure can lead to congestive heart failure, kidney failure, heart attack and stroke. I am a R.N what the first person said is true. She needs to see a doctor,so he can decide what diet she needs to be on. She may very well have high cholestoral as well. She is also at a higher risk for developing childhood diabetes. | 