Effects of Life Style Intervention Manual in Pre Hypertensive Sedentary Population

Hypertension is an increasingly important medical and public health issue. The prevalence of hypertension increases with advancing age to the point where more than half of people 60-69 years of age and approximately three-fourths of those 70 years of age and older are affected. The age related rise in SBP is primarily responsible for an increase in both incidence and prevalence of hypertension with increasing age. At present, it is estimated that about 1 billion people worldwide have hypertension (\>140/90 mmHg), and this number is expected to increase to 1.56 billion by 2025. Because of the new data on lifetime risk of hypertension and the impressive increase in the risk of cardiovascular complications associated with levels of BP previously considered to be normal, the JNC 7 report has introduced a new classification that includes the term "prehypertension" for those with BPs ranging from 120-139 mmHg systolic and/or 80-89 mmHg diastolic. This new designation is intended to identify those individuals in whom early intervention by adoption of healthy lifestyles could reduce BP, decrease the rate of progression of BP to hypertensive levels with age, or prevent hypertension entirely. Prehypertension is not a disease category. Rather, it is a designation chosen to identify individuals at high risk of developing hypertension, so that both patients and clinicians are alerted to this risk and encouraged to intervene and prevent or delay the disease from developing. Individuals who are pre hypertensive are not candidates for drug therapy based on their level of BP and should be firmly and unambiguously advised to practice lifestyle modification in order to reduce their risk of developing hypertension in the future. The goal for individuals with prehypertension and no compelling indications is to lower BP to normal levels with lifestyle changes, and prevent the progressive rise in BP using the recommended lifestyle modifications.