In healthy people, blood pressure tends to decrease at night. However, in the elderly, this mechanism is often disrupted by many factors. One of the common causes is sleep apnea syndrome.
When breathing is interrupted, blood oxygen decreases, the body is forced to activate a response to stay alive, including increasing blood pressure, thereby causing blood pressure to spike.
In addition, taking blood pressure medication at the wrong time, prolonged stress, poor sleep or chronic medical conditions such as diabetes and kidney failure are also cause of uncontrolled blood pressure at night. Many people have the habit of eating salty foods, drinking alcohol or using stimulants at night, all of which silently disrupt the body’s normal biological rhythm.
What are the dangerous complications caused by nocturnal hypertension?
High blood pressure at night is not just a simple physiological phenomenon. According to many studies, this condition is closely related to serious cardiovascular diseases.
Some worrying complications include:
1. Risk of stroke in the early morning
One of the most frightening complications of nocturnal hypertension is cerebral stroke in the morning. When people sleep, blood pressure tends to decrease slightly so that the body can rest. However, if blood pressure still increases silently throughout the night, by about 4-6 am, blood pressure can spike and exceed the tolerance of the cerebral blood vessel wall.
As a result, the risk of rupture, cerebral hemorrhage or cerebral infarction will occur, especially in the elderly with weak blood vessels or a history of cardiovascular disease.
2. Heart exhaustion due to blood pressure burden
Nighttime is the time when the heart should be relaxed, and if the heart still has to bear high pressure, heart failure will occur quickly. High blood pressure at night causes the heart chambers to gradually dilate, weakening its contractile function. From there, arrhythmias such as atrial fibrillation, bradycardia, and paroxysmal tachycardia are very likely to appear.
For the elderly, these are extremely dangerous problems, increasing the risk of sudden death while sleeping without any warning signs.
3. Silently progressing kidney failure
Few people expect that the kidneys are one of the first victims when blood pressure increases at night. When blood flows strongly into the small blood vessels in the kidneys at night, high pressure damages the glomerular capillary structure, causing protein leakage in the urine, damaging the filtering function.
If not detected early, this condition progresses to chronic kidney disease, forcing the patient to undergo dialysis or kidney transplant in the future.
4. Memory loss
Sleep is the time for the brain to recover after a day of activity. But when blood pressure increases at night, the amount of blood that nourishes the brain is seriously affected. This causes nerve cells to not be provided with enough oxygen and nutrients needed to regenerate and remember.
Over time, the elderly is prone to memory loss, confusion, forgetfulness, and even dementia. The worrying thing is that these changes often occur slowly, causing the patient to be subjective and not detect them until the condition becomes severe.
5. Increased risk of death at night
There are many cases of elderly people dying while sleeping, the cause of which is determined to be increased blood pressure at night leading to cardiac arrest or stroke.
Because blood pressure increases at times when it is rarely monitored, it is easily overlooked. That is why experts always recommend monitoring blood pressure day and night, especially for people over 60 years old or with underlying cardiovascular disease, diabetes, or kidney disease.
6. Damage to retinal blood vessels
Sensitive organs in the eye are also seriously affected if blood pressure increases at night. When this condition persists, the small blood vessels in the fundus of the eye may swell, bleed, or even become necrotic.
Elderly people will experience blurred vision, double vision, or significant vision loss for no apparent reason. This is a dangerous complication and can lead to blindness if not detected and treated promptly.
7. Increased risk of coronary artery disease
Unstable blood pressure at night is also one of the factors that promote the formation of coronary atherosclerotic plaques. Over time, the arteries that supply the heart become narrowed, reducing blood flow to the heart muscle. Patients may begin to experience chest tightness, shortness of breath at night or with mild exertion. More dangerously, it can also cause myocardial infarction and directly threaten life.
