Heart Month: research into high blood pressure
Polly Whitworth is a senior research nurse and hypertension specialist nurse at the Radcliffe Department of Medicine, University of Oxford. To mark February’s Heart Month, Polly talks about research into high blood pressure in young adults.
As a member of the research nurse team within Oxford University’s Radcliffe Department of Medicine’s Division of Cardiovascular Medicine, I am fortunate to be able to work on a number of clinical trials and academic studies. I am currently working on the HyperEcho study which links closely with my secondary role as the Hypertension Specialist Nurse within Oxford University Hospital NHS Foundation Trust from where the participants are recruited.
HyperEcho is a multi-centre, longitudinal, observational study to investigate whether baseline transthoracic echocardiography, an ultrasound scan of the heart, along with routine data collection can guide clinicians to better manage and improve risk stratification, the classification of disease, for cardiovascular disease in young adults with hypertension.
In the UK, at least one in 17 young adults below the age of 40 have high blood pressure. Controlling blood pressure in this population can be a challenge for clinicians because information on the management of high blood pressure is mainly obtained from older people. To overcome this challenge, we study clinical data including blood pressure measurements and treatment plans in young adults and will link them with the findings of clinical investigations.
Through HyperEcho, our aims are to identify whether young adults with hypertension can be separated into different groups based on patterns of cardiac structure as well as other risk factors and to identify whether groups defined by cardiac structure and function and/or risk factors are different. The study participants receive cardiac echocardiography which will help identify novel imaging and circulating biomarkers, indicators of disease, that predict disease patterns or response to treatment.
We are also interested in finding out the severity and stage of hypertension as well as identifying the type of hypertension (i.e primary or secondary) and underlying diagnosis. This study enables us to track the progress of hypertension during follow- up and response to anti-hypertensive medication.
For more information visit the HyperEcho study website.
