INTRODUCTION:

Blood pressure is the force that moves blood through our circulatory system.^[1]It is a life force because, without blood pressure, the following two basic provisions would not be pushed around our circulatory system to feed tissues and organs:

1.Oxygen

2.Nutrients.^[2]

Blood pressure is vital also because it delivers white blood cells and antibodies for immunity, and hormones such as insulin.^[3]

In other words, "Blood pressure" usually refers to the arterial pressure in the systemic circulation.^[4]Normal resting blood pressure in an adult is approximately 120/80 mm Hg.^[5]When your heart beats, it contracts and pushes blood through the arteries to the rest of the body. This force creates pressure on the arteries. This is called systolic blood pressure.^[6]

A normal systolic blood pressure is below 120.^[7]

A systolic blood pressure number of 140 or higher is considered to be hypertension, or high blood pressure.^[8]

The diastolic blood pressure number or the bottom number indicates the pressure in the arteries when the heart rests between beats.^[9]

A normal diastolic blood pressure is below 80.^[10]

A diastolic blood pressure number of 90 or higher is considered to be hypertension or high blood pressure^[11]

Stress is a reaction to stimulus that disturbs our physical or mental equilibrium causing hormones such as adrenaline and cortisol to surge through the body^[12].In psychology, stress is a feeling of strain and pressure. Excessive amounts of stress, however, may lead to bodily harm.^[13]Stress can increase the risk of stroke, heart attacks, ulcers and mental disorders such as depression and even suicide.^[12]

Stress can be external and related to the environment, but may also be created by internal perceptions that cause an individual to experience anxiety other negative emotions surrounding a situation, such as pressure, discomfort, etc.^[14],[15]

Stress is an important factor which causes blood pressure.^[16]Stress related blood pressure is measured by considering various criteria such as persons' food intake ,their workload, surrounding environment, social relationships etc.^[17],[18]In order to create awareness about stress related blood pressure, a survey is conducted through a standardised questionnaire distributed to selective number of people. If an awareness is created, we can avoid the risk of developing long term stress related blood pressure.

MATERIALS AND METHODS:

The sample size of this study is 110.The study group consists of 20,30,40,50 year old adults. The study was conducted in the city of Chennai(Tamil Nadu, India).This was a questionnaire based study. The questionnaire has 13 factors involved in stress related blood pressure such as sex, age, occupation, income, food habits, working hours, social relationship etc. The choices were created after closely monitoring and examination of these factors in and around the city.Some factors are compared to get the exact results. Sex factors are male and female. Age factors considered here involves under 20 years,20 to 30 years,30 to 40 years and 40 to 50 years. Stress factors considered here are academics, workload, work tension, surroundings, family situation and personal problems. Occupation includes Student, Business, Information Technology, Household worker and Driver. Financial status includes upper class people, middle class people and lower class people.

SURVEY QUESTIONNAIRE:

A general survey is taken through a standardised questionnaire which involves sex, age, occupation, financial status, duration of working hours, their food intake, exercising habits, stress factors and social relationship and distributed to 110 people (study population).

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION:

1.Sex and Stress:

When sex and stress are compared(Table 1) (Graph 1),the reason for stress in female population is mainly due to work tension(40.4%)as compared with male, the stress was attributed to relationship with surroundings (25.4%) and personal problems (22.2%).But ironically, female showed 0% stress towards personal problems and 2.1% with respect to relationship with surroundings.

2.Age and Stress:

When age and stress are compared, People below 20 years show more academic stress (Table 2) (Graph 2), since it is very much evident that their priority is only the studies. This shows that students under 20 years have only academic stress (45.8%).People who is between 20-30 years of age face work tension as a leading stress (36.8%).30-40 year people have all type of stress which includes more work tension (24.3%),surrounding stress (21.6%), personal problems (18.9%) and less academic stress (8.1%). Ironically people aged between 40 to 50 years are less stressed comparatively to the other age groups.

3.Occupation and Stress:

(Table 3)(Graph 3)shows the comparison between occupation and stress. Most of the people get stressed due to work. Some people take their job as a burden and get stressed.

In other cases, people who love their job also suffer from stress due to high workload. The occupation which involves high stress are student, Business, IT, Household worker and driver. The stress due to academics is (69.2%) is more in students. For business people, workload (75.0%)is more than any other stress factors mentioned above. People working in Information technology suffer from heavy work tension (78.4%). Household workers have more personal problems (52.4%).The drivers get stressed predominantly due to their surroundings (78.6%) and partly stressed due to Personal Problems (21.4%).

4.Financial Status and Stress:

(Table 4) (Graph 4) shows the comparison between financial status and stress. Money is the major factor considered here. Money makes a person richer, famous and recognised easier. Especially upper class people have great respect in this society. They face stress with respect to academics of their children (64.2%).Upper class people don't face other stress like family situation, personal problem, work tension and workload because of their financial position. Middle class people are the ones who suffer from all type of stress..Personal problems(24.1%)Work tension(24.1%) and family situation (22.4%) make them more stressed. For lower class people, it is contradictory. Their goals are less because of their day to day struggle and are not pushed into any family situations. Only stress for them is that they have to work more to earn money. So work tension stress (53.6%)is more in lower class people.

5.Blood Pressure and Stress:

According to the survey, the study population is classified into two groups ,which has shown increased BP with stress and other group with normal BP.

The population which shown an increased BP due to (Table5)(Graph5) work tension (26.6%), workload (16.9%) followed by family situation (15.6%), personal problems(13.0%) and academics (15.6%). The survey results shows that when work tension, workload and problems with respect to family and surroundings increases. It may land up in increased BP.

CONCLUSION:

Nowadays blood pressure is more prevalent in people. A survey is conducted through a questionnaire distributed to 110 people about stress induced blood pressure, because recent researches suggest that stress is the major factor which causes blood pressure. Not only stress, other factors like food intake, financial status, working hours and social relationship also contribute to blood pressure. From the above discussion, we came to conclusion that stress is not permanent. It can be solved by taking stress relief measures like going to gym, meditation, medication under doctors advice, involving into good social relationship and being happy. If students study daily, they can reduce their academic workload. This survey has showed that both male and females are more stressed because of work tension (26.4%) followed byworkload (17.3%), academics (16.4%), surroundings (15.5%), personal problems (12.7%) and family situation(11.8%).

This survey is done to create an awareness among the society that prevention is better than cure when it comes to blood pressure. From this survey, it has been learnt that hailing facts for increased BP in mainly work tension, social relationship and academics. These factors can be taken care keeping our health in mind. Therefore a small awareness will lead to a great health benefit among the growing population.

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Received on 31.03.2016 Modified on 22.04.2016

Research J. Pharm. and Tech 2016; 9(8):1488-1492.

DOI: 10.5958/0974-360X.2016.00289.4