High blood pressure can cause your brain to age faster

ByDr. Daniel Thomas, DO, MS

Researchers University of California Davis found that young people approaching middle age with high blood pressure—even mildly elevated levels for which doctors don’t treat—experience accelerated brain aging. This is because high blood pressure makes arteries stiffer over time, and reduces crucial blood flow to the brain.

Participants in the study with higher blood pressure showed poorer brain health to those with normal blood pressure. Those with high blood pressure were found by MRI to have less gray matter in the frontal and temporal lobes than those in the normal blood pressure group. For instance, a 33-year-old with high blood pressure had a brain aged equally to a 40-year-old’s with normal blood pressure.

This new research gives yet another reason to have your blood pressure checked regularly, and if it is elevated, to have it treated.

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