Physicians in the UAE will now measure and record blood pressure keeping in mind your profession among other risk factors such as family history, dietary and smoking habits.

“This question is an essential part of the questionnaire in the newly released guidelines for the unified management of hypertension,” said Professor Gerard Plante, Professor of Medicine, Physiology and Pharmacology, University of Sherbrooke, Canada.

“Your profession may be stressful and this may mean a blood pressure reading different from people from less stressful professions,” he said. Therefore, now it is essential to evaluate the blood pressure value and treat it with relativity to your profession, he added.

Launching the first manual of its kind in the region on Tuesday, Dr Mahmoud Fikree,  CEO-Health Policies at the Ministry of Health said hypertension was among the most common cardiovascular disorder in the UAE.

It is also a major risk factor for cardiovascular, cerebrovascular and renal diseases. The manual will act as a unified guide for treatment of hypertension in primary healthcare and help standardise the diagnosis and treatment.

It will also facilitate follow up patients’ treatment. Quoting a report from the National Epidemiological Study Hypertension in UAE, Dr Fikree said that 36.6 per cent of UAE nationals from Sharjah only were suffering from hypertension.

“Those screened were from the age group 18-75 years and more females than males had hypertension,” he said.

The manual has been launched at the primary care level to increase the speed and improve the diagnosis and treatment methods, said the experts.

“We have to see whether changing patterns of lifestyle is one of the main causes of disease,” said Dr Muna Al Kawari, Director of Primary Health Care Department at the ministry.

“Primary health care is the perfect place to diagnose, treat and follow up diseases while patient access to health centres is also easy,” she added.

asmaalizain@khaleejtimes.ae