What you need to know about new blood pressure guidelines and your heart health

For the first time since 2017, there are new guidelines for blood pressure to help prevent future health conditions like heart disease and dementia.

And these new recommendations have doctors being a little more aggressive about high levels of blood pressure.

In the U.S., nearly half of all adults have higher than normal blood pressure. But many may not know it.

State one hypertension is 130 over 80 mm of mercury and higher, according to new guidelines from the American Heart Association and the American College of Cardiology.

“We’ve got to start thinking about people actually having hypertension, calling it hypertension even at lower numbers, and we have to treat it more aggressively,” said Dr. Sanjay Gupta, a neurosurgeon with Grady Memorial Hospital.

High blood pressure doesn’t typ