Research Shows Importance of Second Pediatric Blood Pressure Screening
Summary
"Pediatricians dont diagnose hypertension in children very often, but if it is there, we want to find it," said Robert James Riewerts, MD, regional chief of Pediatrics for the Southern California Permanente Medical Group."Because an elevated first blood pressure in youth is common, correct identification of truly elevated blood pressure may be a first step to improve the recognition of hypertension in pediatric care," said Corinna Koebnick, PhD, MSc, of the Kaiser Permanente Southern California Department of Research & Evaluation.Other authors on the paper include Yasmina D. Mohan, MPH, and Xia Li, MSc, with the Kaiser Permanente Southern California Department of Research & Evaluation in Pasadena, California; Amy H. Porter, MD, Kaiser Permanente Los Angeles Medical Center, Los Angeles; Matthew F. Daley, MD, Kaiser Permanente Institute for Health Research, Denver; Gang Luo, PhD, Department of Biomedical Informatics and Medical Education, University of Washington, Seattle; and Beatriz D. Kuizon, MD, Department of Biomedical Informatics and Medical Education, University of Washington, Seattle.Care for members and patients is focused on their total health and guided by their personal Permanente Medical Group physicians, specialists and team of caregivers.Related Links PASADENA, Calif., Jan. 12, 2018 /PRNewswire/ -- Nearly one-quarter of children and teens who had their blood pressure screened at a primary care appointment showed a reading in the hypertensive range, but less than half of those readings could be confirmed after the blood pressure was repeated, according to a new Kaiser Permanente study released today in The Journal of Clinical Hypertension .