Living Well Sefton are working with the charity Blood Pressure UK to promote blood pressure awareness during this Know Your Numbers Week.

As part of the campaign, a blood pressure kiosk has been setup in Strand By Me in Bootle Strand and anyone is welcome to use this to check their blood pressure free of charge. The kiosk will also offer advice on how stay healthy and monitor blood pressure levels, and will be at the Strand until March 2023.

Blood Pressure UK is urging all adults (of all ages) to check their blood pressure, ideally with a home blood pressure monitor and at the same time reduce their salt intake. The more people test, enabling them to control their high blood pressure, the more premature deaths due to strokes, heart attacks and heart failure will be prevented. Especially since high blood pressure is largely symptomless and also one of the biggest single (and preventable) causes of death in the UK.

Despite nearly half (45%) of the UK population having had their blood pressure checked in the last 12 months, over half of these (56%) don’t know their blood pressure numbers and could be living with undiagnosed high blood pressure.

Substantial evidence supporting the use of home blood pressure monitoring has shown it gives a better reflection of blood pressure, as being tested in somewhere like a GP surgery or pharmacy, where patients might feel anxious, can affect the result.

What’s more, home testing enable patients to monitor their condition more easily in the long term. According to NHS England, regular home blood pressure monitoring across a population of 50,000 patients could prevent up to 500 heart attacks and 745 strokes over five years.

Margaret Jones, Sefton Council’s Director of Public Health said:

“I would encourage Sefton residents to take part in Knowing Your Numbers and check their blood pressure. This is very important as high blood pressure doesn’t always have clear symptoms and can have a harmful effect on health and wellbeing. People can lower their blood pressure through being a healthy weight, eating less salt, eating more fruit and vegetables and doing more exercise.”

Guidelines on monitoring blood pressure are available free on the Blood Pressure UK website at www.bloodpressureuk.org/your-blood-pressure/how-to-lower-your-blood-pressure/monitoring-your-blood-pressure-at-home/