Hypertensive crisis: symptoms and first aid

Around the world, hypertensive disease suffers quite a lot of people. In some patients, periodically there is a hypertensive crisis, the symptoms of which are a strong increase in blood pressure, which leads to damage to the heart, blood vessels, brain. With this condition, pressure indicators often reach the numbers 220/120, but the crisis can occur even at much lower values - it all depends on the overall health of the hypertension.

The mechanism of occurrence

Hypertensive crisis symptoms in the form of increased blood pressure causes a violation of the balance between the tone of the vessels and the minute volume of blood pushed into the vascular bed . Thus in small vessels there is a spasm, and the heart is reduced quite powerfully, which entails an increase in blood pressure and a violation of delivery to tissues and organs of oxygen.

Hypertensive crisis: symptoms and types

The condition can be uncomplicated and complicated. In the first case, treatment is done on an outpatient basis, in full, the pressure can be reduced in 1-2 days. In the second case, a life-threatening crisis develops, it requires emergency treatment and, in the event of failure to provide timely assistance, often leads to disability or death.

Uncomplicated hypertensive crisis symptoms, in addition to increasing blood pressure, include such as dyspnea, excessive sweating, headache, nausea. The patient may experience anxiety, mental agitation, fear, a feeling of heat. With all the abundance of unpleasant manifestations of damage, no organs occur, and a life-threatening condition does not arise, which can not be said of a complicated hypertensive crisis. During it, a sharp jump in blood pressure can provoke the development of acute encephalopathy, a heart attack or stroke (chest pains occur, the consciousness is broken), pulmonary edema (blue lips, severe dyspnea), acute renal failure (or stops urination), optic nerve edema (Vision falls sharply). Such patients should be immediately hospitalized.

Hypertensive crisis: first aid

As already noted, uncomplicated crisis is not dangerous for life. Nevertheless, every hypertensive patient should have information about how to help themselves in the event of the development of such a condition. There are a number of tablets designed to lower blood pressure. However, you need to do this in accordance with certain rules. So, in the first two hours it is permissible to reduce blood pressure by no more than 20-25%. Within 6 hours it should be reduced to the numbers 160/100. Norms (values 120/80) should be reached after 1-2 days. So, the drugs, with which you should carry out the normalization of blood pressure in hypertensive crisis, include medicines "Captopril", "Carvedilol", "Nifedipine", "Furosemide", "Clonidine." Most of them begin to act about half an hour after admission.

The patient, who developed a complicated crisis, before the arrival of an ambulance can only be helped by realizing which organ has been affected. So, with a heart attack, the victim should take a nitroglycerin pill under the tongue, drink an aspirin tablet. If pulmonary edema develops, hypertensive crisis can be attempted by taking nitroglycerin under the tongue, and inside - 40 mg of furosemide, the patient should take a sitting position, lowering his legs to the floor.