Does diabetes cause high blood pressure?

People with diabetes have a high risk of high blood pressure (hypertension) and vice versa. Having both conditions can worsen each condition. The cause and effect relationship is largely due to risk factors that diabetes and hypertension share, including obesity and unhealthy diet.

Early diagnosis and treatment of diabetes can help reduce the risk of hypertension. It can also prevent potentially serious complications from high blood pressure, including heart disease, cerebral vascular accidents and kidney failure.

How diabetes causes high blood pressure

Studies suggest that diabetes – most specifically type 2 diabetes – supports the risk of hypertension compared to people without diabetes. It does it directly and indirectly in several key ways:

• Shared risk factors: Type 2 diabetes and high blood pressure are influenced by many of the same risk factors, including obesity, an inactive lifestyle, unhealthy diet and excessive belly fat.
• Diabetic kidney disease: Diabetes can damage the kidneys, causing an increase in blood pressure while the body retains sodium and excessive water. It can also increase due to the stenosis of the renal artery, a condition in which the blood vessels supplying the kidneys begin to shrink.
• Vascular damage: Blood sugar, a characteristic of type 2 diabetes, can also damage blood vessels, causing an increase in blood pressure when the vessels shrink and stiffen.
• Insulin resistance: Type 2 diabetes is characterized by insulin resistance, in which the body is less sensitive to hormonal insulin which regulates blood sugar. Insulin resistance, in turn, disturbs the sympathetic nervous system, which regulates blood pressure and sodium excretion.

What is blood pressure causes diabetes

Although diabetes can cause high blood pressure, hypertension can also contribute to type 2 diabetes in several indirect ways.

Among them, high blood pressure can cause changes in blood vessels that reduce the delivery of insulin and glucose to cells. This can lead to resistance to insulin and diabetes as the body becomes less sensitive to constantly high insulin levels. The pancreas, the organ that manufactures insulin, can also release less insulin over time because it becomes less able to follow high persistent glucose levels.

Hypertension and diabetes are also associated with oxidative stress (the imbalance of beneficial antioxidants and harmful molecules called free radicals in the body). As such, the oxidative stress caused by hypertension can result in the worsening of type 2 diabetes, and vice versa.

Long -term risks and complications

Diabetes and hypertension are both associated with the overactivation of the renin-angiotensin-aldosterone system (RAAS). It is a coordinated hormone and enzymes system that maintain your stable blood pressure by controlling the amount of liquid in your blood vessels.

The overractivation of Raas is linked to type 2 diabetes and high blood pressure and also to potentially serious complications of type 2 diabetes and high blood pressure, in particular:

• Eye diseases: Alone or together, diabetes and high blood pressure can increase the risk of glaucoma by around 20% compared to people without disease. Poorly controlled hypertension also doubles the risk of diabetic retinopathy, a serious ocular complication of type 2 diabetes.
• Heart disease: Together, type 2 diabetes and hypertension increases the risk of cardiovascular disease twice to four times compared to adults without diabetes type 2 or hypertension. This includes an increased risk of heart attack, coronary disease (CAD) and heart failure.
• Stroke: People with diabetes have double the risk of stroke compared to people without diabetes. The risk is even higher in people with diabetes and hypertension, which are two to six times more likely to feel a stroke (blocking blood flow in the brain).
• Chronic kidney disease: Diabetes and hypertension are both considered causes of chronic kidney disease (CKD).

How to know if you suffer from hypertension

Hypertension affects almost half of all adults in the United States and is often called “silent killer” because it rarely causes symptoms.

Even thus, it can easily be detected with an inflatable device known as sphygmomanometer (COFF of blood pressure) which measures both your systolic blood pressure (the first or the upper number measuring the pressure on the walls of the artery when your heart contracts) and the lower diastolic blood pressure (the second of the lower number measuring when your heart is at rest).

According to the American Heart Association (AHA), you suffer from hypertension if your blood pressure is 130/80 millimeters of mercury (MM HG) or more. While the American Diabetes Association (ADA) previously fixed the basic line at 140/90 mm Hg for people with diabetes, she revised her definitions in 2023 to align with those of AHA.

How to manage blood pressure in diabetes

No less than 70% of adults living with diabetes have high blood pressure, While around 50% of adults with hypertension have resistance to insulin. Effective management of the two conditions can prevent potentially serious complications such as heart attacks or brain vascular accidents.

Lifestyle changes

Diabetes and hypertension share many risk factors and can benefit from changes to your diet and your lifestyle, in particular:

• Eat a balanced diet: This includes the increase in your consumption of fruits, vegetables, whole grains and poultry or lean fish and reduce saturated fats, refined carbohydrates, sodium and fatty or transformed meats.
• Exercise regularly: Get at least 150 minutes of moderate intensity aerobic activity each week to include exercise most days of the week. The moderate intensity exercises are those in which you can speak but not sing, such as a fast walk, bicycle, dance or double tennis.
• Maintain a healthy weight: If you are overweight or have obesity, plan to work with a personal coach and / or a nutritionist to reach and maintain a body mass index (BMI) between 18.5 and 24.9.
• Quit smoking: Smoking causes the narrowing of blood vessels, which independently increases blood pressure. To improve your chances of stopping, ask your health care provider on aid for the cessation of smoking, many of which are entirely covered by most insurance plans, including under the affordable care law.

Drugs

If lifestyle changes are not enough to control your blood pressure, your health care provider may prescribe drugs called antihypertensives. These drugs, taken orally, can be used alone or in combination to help regulate blood pressure.

First line options include:

For people with hypertension resistant treatment, particularly common in people with diabetes, a class of diuretics called antagonists of the mineralocorticoid receptor (MR) can help. These include drugs such as Spironolactone which can also reduce the risk of complications from heart disease.

Monitoring

Due to high hypertension rates in the United States, the working group on preventive services (USPSTF) recommends the annual blood pressure annual screening for all adults aged 40 and over, as well as anyone at increased risk of hypertension (such as smokers or people with diabetes).

For people aged 18 to 39 without risk factors, blood pressure screening every three to five years is appropriate.

Another key to keeping diabetes and hypertension under control is self-monitoring with domestic devices. This includes standard or continuous glucose meters used to follow blood sugar and home sphygmomanometers that help you monitor your blood pressure.

Experts recommend buying automatic cuff -style monitors, which are more precise than wrist or fingers monitors. By keeping a trace of your readings, you can contact your health care provider if your treatments do not work or cause abnormal blood pressure drops.

Ways to reduce your risk

You cannot always avoid diabetes or hypertension, since genetics can predispose you to diseases. That said, type 2 diabetes and hypertension are strongly influenced by modifiable risk factors that you can modify.

The strategies to reduce the risk of hypertension development include:

• Reduce your salt consumption: AHA does not recommend more than 2,300 milligrams (MG) of sodium per day, equal to 1 tablespoon of table salt. If you have trouble controlling your blood pressure, switch to 1,000 to 1,500 mg per day.
• Find salt substitutes: Use herbs, spices and lemon juice to season your food rather than salt.
• Check food labels: Choose foods with less than 400 mg of sodium per portion, And avoid processed restaurants or fast-charge which are generally rich in sodium.
• Try the Dash diet: DASH (food approaches to stop hypertension) is a flexible and balanced diet with proven recording to help people lower their blood pressure.
• Limit your alcohol consumption: Alcohol can increase your heart rate and blood pressure up to 24 hours after consumption. Experts advise that men should not have more than two alcoholic drinks per day, and women should not have more alcoholic beverages per day.
• Manage stress: Stress contributes directly to high blood pressure but can also contribute to diabetes by triggering behavior such as smoking and supercharging. Routine exercise and improving sleep hygiene can reduce stress, as well as body-spirit therapies such as yoga and meditation.

Summary

Diabetes and hypertension are strongly linked, often occurring together due to disease mechanisms and risk factors. Having both conditions may increase the risk of heart disease, stroke, kidney disease and other complications. Effective management of diabetes and high blood pressure is crucial to reduce these risks.