Low blood pressure is dangerous than a high blood pressure. As the researchers has revealed that Patients with low blood pressure before an operation are at an increased risk of death during or after the surgery than those with preoperative high blood pressure.

To prove this, the scientists used data from 252,278 patients from the United Kingdom Clinical Practice Research Datalink to perform their analysis. Several models of varying complexities were used to account for 29 perioperative risk factors including age, gender, race, underlying health conditions, drug treatments, and surgical risk score. After taking account of influential risk factors, the effect of systolic and diastolic high blood pressure was no longer associated with an increased risk of perioperative death.

For patients with a systolic blood pressure below 100 mmHg, the likelihood of death increased by 40%. For those with a diastolic BP of under 40mmHg, the likelihood of death increased by 2.5 times. While the risk from low blood pressure was present in patients with low systolic or low diastolic pressure, values below 100/40 were of greatest risk.

The experts suggest: “Preoperative low blood pressure is under-recognised as a risk factor for perioperative mortality. Future studies will need to identify how this risk can be modified to improve patient outcomes.”

The study was presented at Euroanaesthesia 2015, the European Anaesthesiology Congress, in Berlin, Germany.

By Lizitha