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Does High Blood Pressure Lead To Headaches?

By Dr. Ganga Sapkota · · Updated

Does high blood pressure lead to headache
Contents

This post was most recently updated on July 25th, 2023

Many people think that high blood pressure can cause headaches. You may picture the heart beating harder and blood pushing against the artery walls until your head starts to throb.

Table Of Contents

  1. Overview- Why do hypertensive patients have fewer headaches?- What is malignant hypertension?- What are the symptoms of this disease?- What should you keep in mind?

For everyday high blood pressure, researchers have found little evidence for this.

Read on and find out the truth about the link between headaches and blood pressure.

Overview

Headaches were long seen as a warning sign of high blood pressure. Research has since found little link between ordinary high blood pressure and headaches. Still, many patients and some doctors assume high blood pressure is behind a headache.

In fact, the CDC explains that high blood pressure usually has no warning signs or symptoms. Measuring it is the only way to know you have it.

Neurologist Deborah Friedman notes several reasons why the belief persists:

  • Acute pain, including a bad headache, can raise blood pressure for a while.
  • Headaches can be a side effect of some antihypertensive drugs.
  • On the other hand, some blood pressure drugs also help prevent headaches.

Why do hypertensive patients have fewer headaches?

A large study in Norway suggests that people with high blood pressure may have fewer headaches. Researchers measured the blood pressure of 22,685 adults and asked about headaches about 11 years later.

People with a systolic blood pressure of 150 mm Hg or higher had about a 30% lower risk of non-migraine headache than those under 140. The study found no clear link with migraine.

The systolic reading is the top number of a blood pressure reading. The researchers suggested reduced pain sensitivity in people with hypertension (hypalgesia) as a possible explanation.

What is malignant hypertension?

Headaches can be one of the symptoms of severe or malignant high blood pressure. This is very high blood pressure that comes on suddenly and quickly, and it affects only a small number of people with high blood pressure.

Malignant hypertension is more common in younger adults, especially African American men. It can also affect people with kidney problems, lupus or similar disorders, and pregnancy-related high blood pressure (preeclampsia).

What are the symptoms of this disease?

Signs of malignant hypertension include headache, blurred vision, and confusion or other mental changes. You may also have nausea or vomiting, numbness or weakness, shortness of breath, chest pain, less urine, or a seizure.

Malignant hypertension is a medical emergency. You need to go to a hospital right away, where you will receive intravenous medicines to bring your blood pressure down safely.

What should you keep in mind?

Common tension headaches have little or no link with high blood pressure.

Migraine and high blood pressure are both common, so many people have both. That overlap does not mean one causes the other.

Headache is not a reliable sign of hypertension, except in a hypertensive emergency. The best way to know your numbers is to have your blood pressure checked regularly.

Sources

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