{"id":279604,"date":"2025-11-13T03:58:09","date_gmt":"2025-11-13T03:58:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/279604\/"},"modified":"2025-11-13T03:58:09","modified_gmt":"2025-11-13T03:58:09","slug":"rates-of-high-blood-pressure-in-children-have-nearly-doubled-in-20-years","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/279604\/","title":{"rendered":"Rates of high blood pressure in children have nearly doubled in 20 years"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n Global rates of hypertension, or high blood pressure, in childhood<\/a> and adolescence have nearly doubled since 2000, putting more kids at risk for poor health later in life.\n <\/p>\n

\n \u201cIn 2000, about 3.4% of boys and 3% of girls had hypertension. By 2020, those numbers had risen to 6.5% and 5.8% respectively,\u201d said Dr. Peige Song, a researcher from the School of Public Health at Zhejiang University School of Medicine in China. Song is one of the authors of a study describing the findings that published Wednesday in the journal The Lancet Child and Adolescent Health.\n <\/p>\n

\n Children who have hypertension could be at greater risk later on of developing heart disease \u2013\u2013 the No. 1 cause of death<\/a> in the United States, said Dr. Mingyu Zhang, assistant professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School and Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center. He was not involved in the research.\n <\/p>\n

\n \u201cThe good news is that this is a modifiable risk,\u201d Song said in an email. \u201cWith better screening, earlier detection, and a stronger focus on prevention, especially around healthy weight and nutrition, we can intervene before complications arise.\u201d\n <\/p>\n

\n The rise in hypertension in children is likely due to many factors.\n <\/p>\n

\n Childhood obesity is a significant risk factor, because it is associated with factors like insulin resistance, inflammation and vascular function, Song said.\n <\/p>\n

\n Dietary factors such as consuming high levels of sodium and ultraprocessed food can also contribute to hypertension risk, as well as poor sleep quality, stress and genetic predisposition, she said.\n <\/p>\n

\n Many children also get less movement than past generations and spend more time on sedentary activities, like screen use, which may be affecting risk, she said.\n <\/p>\n

\n \u201cWe are also starting to know that other factors, including environmental pollutants, can contribute,\u201d Zhang added.\n <\/p>\n

\n Zhang served as senior author on a previous study<\/a> that showed a connection between prebirth exposure to chemicals called PFAS \u2014 a class of about 15,000 human-made compounds linked to cancers, endocrine-related conditions and developmental issues in children \u2014 and childhood hypertension. Short for perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances, PFAS are sometimes called \u201cforever chemicals\u201d because they don\u2019t fully break down in the environment.\n <\/p>\n

\n The biggest takeaway of this research for families is not to assume high blood pressure is only a problem for adults, Song said.\n <\/p>\n

\n If you are worried about your child\u2019s risk for obesity or hypertension, pressure, shame and restriction are not the best approaches.\n <\/p>\n

\n Instead, focus on increasing healthy behaviors in a happy way, said Jill Castle, a pediatric dietitian in Massachusetts, in a previous CNN article<\/a>.\n <\/p>\n

\n \u201cThe goal of the food pillar is really to embrace flexibility with food and to emphasize foods that are highly nutritious and \u2026 to allow foods also that might be minimally nutritious within the diet in ways that can be fully enjoyed and flexible,\u201d Castle said.\n <\/p>\n

\n Try to prioritize sitting down as a family for meals and avoid labeling foods as \u201cgood\u201d or \u201cbad,\u201d said Castle, author of \u201cKids Thrive at Every Size<\/a>.\u201d\n <\/p>\n

\n \u201cThe clean plate club or rewarding with sweets \u2014 they might work in the moment, but they don\u2019t do a good job of establishing the self-trust and an intuitive, good relationship with food as kids grow up,\u201d Castle said.\n <\/p>\n

\n The study didn\u2019t just track rates in the United States. Instead, researchers analyzed data from 96 studies across 21 countries.\n <\/p>\n

\n Another important consideration the study team made is how blood pressure differs in and outside the doctor\u2019s office. Some children might have normal blood pressure at home, but a higher reading in the office, while others might have a lower blood pressure in the office than they normally would.\n <\/p>\n

\n By including data from both office visits and at-home blood pressure readings, the researchers were able to include hypertension rates that are \u201cmasked,\u201d or wouldn\u2019t be caught in a doctor\u2019s visit, Zhang said. Masked hypertension was found to be the most common kind, according to the data.\n <\/p>\n

\n \u201cThis is important because it means that many children with true hypertension could go undetected if we rely only on office blood pressure readings,\u201d he said.\n <\/p>\n

\n The result show that one reading may not be enough, and there may be a need for more scalable solutions for better monitoring and care of hypertension around the world, Song added.\n <\/p>\n

\n Get inspired by a weekly roundup on living well, made simple. Sign up for CNN\u2019s Life, But Better newsletter<\/a> for information and tools designed to improve your well-being.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Global rates of hypertension, or high blood pressure, in childhood and adolescence have nearly doubled since 2000, putting…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":279605,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[49,48,84,392],"class_list":{"0":"post-279604","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-healthcare","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-health","11":"tag-healthcare"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/279604","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=279604"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/279604\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/279605"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=279604"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=279604"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=279604"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}