According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, high blood pressure was a primary or contributing cause of more than a half million deaths in the United States in 2019. Researchers at the University of Alabama at Birmingham have launched a study in a subset of patients — obese individuals who experience high blood pressure at nighttime.
Pankaj Arora, M.D., an associate professor in the UAB Heersink School of Medicine Division of Cardiovascular Disease, was awarded a $3.7 million grant from the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute to study whether increasing natriuretic peptide levels using FDA-approved drugs at nighttime will help improve the nighttime blood pressure in obese individuals.
Obese individuals with high blood pressure at nighttime have an increased risk of a fatal cardiac event even if their daytime blood pressure is normal. With nearly half of the population in the United States expected to be obese by 2030, the risk of heart attack or stroke from high nighttime blood pressure is expected to climb drastically. Scientists believe that the 24-hour rhythm of heart hormones called natriuretic peptides may play a role in this increase in nighttime blood pressure.
Arora’s past research has shown that obese individuals can have up to 40 percent lower levels of beneficial natriuretic peptides throughout a 24-hour period. Now, Arora and other researchers are studying whether high nighttime blood pressure can be better managed by prescribing medication that increases levels of natriuretic peptides and by changing the time of day people take these medications.