Blood Pressure Lab

Megan Yakovich
Blood Pressure Lab
1. State a problem about the relationship of age and gender to blood pressure.
* The wording of this question is confusing to me... "state a problem"? I'm not exactly sure what this is asking me.
To the best of my ability: I think a "problem" about the relationship of age and gender to blood pressure is:
- Age: As a person's age increases, their blood pressure will increase.
- Gender: I'm truly not sure. I would think it has less to do with gender than it does with lifestyle choices, heredity, etc. But if I have to guess, I suppose I would guess that males have higher blood pressure than females, in general.
2. Use your knowledge about the heart and the circulatory system to make a hypothesis about how the average blood pressure for a group of people would be affected by manipulating the age and gender of the group members.
I hypothesize that, as a person ages, his or her blood pressure would increase. This is because many people tend to become less active as they age, and exercise is vital to the health of the heart and circulatory system. They also tend to pick up "bad" habits that they did not have when they were young, such as smoking and drinking.
Gender: Again, I truly don't know how gender affects blood pressure. On average, do more men drink than women? I don't know, but if so, it would make sense that their blood pressure would be higher. ??
Which gender, in general, tends to exercise more? I would guess women… but I don’t even know why.  If one were to assume this were true, women would have lower blood pressure than men.
3. How will you use the investigation screen to test your hypothesis? What steps will you follow? What data will you record?
I don’t know, because I don’t even know how the experiment works yet! I don’t know what steps to follow or what data to record, because I haven’t seen how it works yet. I would assume that I will track the people’s blood pressures, and then document any details given to me about their lifestyles that would help me understand why they have the high blood pressure.
4. Analyze the result of your experiment. Explain any patterns you observed.
The results of my experiment are that men do have higher blood pressure than women (in general), and blood pressure does seem to increase (in both sexes) as age increases. Interestingly enough, the only time that the group average for men was lower than the women’s average is in the age group of 11-17. In this age group, NO ONE, neither male or female had high blood pressure. However, the average blood pressure for the female group was 119/76, while the male group’s average was 117/75. In this particular group, when I looked at each medical history of every subject, both groups had only 1 person each who had a history of hypertension and lack of exercise. The only difference was that the female group also had one person with a high salt diet.
Every other age group, from 18-54, showed that men had higher blood pressure than women. In the 18-24 age group, only two females showed hypertension. One (24 years) had a family history of hypertension and a high salt diet, but was only 3 pounds overweight. The other female (19 years) had a family history of hypertension and a lack of exercise, but was also 36 pounds overweight. The men in the same age group also showed two people as having hypertension. The first, 18, was 44 lbs overweight, exhibited a lack of exercise, and drank alcohol. The other, 19 years, was only 3 lbs overweight, but had the family history, a high salt diet, and a lack of exercise. The 25-34 age group, I didn’t have a single woman with high blood pressure, which I found very hard to believe. For the same age group, I had 2 men with high blood pressure. Both had a family history of hypertension and were significantly overweight (by 50+ pounds.) Age group 35-44: two females, 3 males. Interestingly, neither of the females were overweight. In fact, the 39 year old drank alcohol, but had no other “predispositions”. The second only exhibited a lack of exercise. As for the men in this age group, two were significantly overweight. The third was only 4 lbs over his optimal weight, but had the hereditary hypertension and a high salt diet. He was also older than the other two men. 45-54: 3 females exhibited hypertension. Two were significantly overweight, and one exhibited 3 of the 4 “components” linked to high blood pressure. In the male group, there were actually 7 in this age group to have hypertension. 4 of the 7 were significantly overweight. I found it very interesting that one subject, a 46 year old man who was actually 5 lbs underweight exhibited high blood pressure when his only factor was drinking alcohol.
5. Did the result of your experiment support your hypothesis? Why or why not? Based on your experiment what conclusion can you draw about the relationship of age and gender to group blood pressure averages?
Yes, my hypothesis was supported. The older you get, the higher your blood pressure, in general. Also, even though I was just guessing in the beginning, it seems that men do in fact have higher blood pressure than women.
6. During the course of your experiment, did you obtain any blood pressure reading that were outside of the normal range for the group being tested? What did you notice on the medical charts for these individuals that might explain their high reading?
Yes, there were some who were outside the normal range in both sexes. Their medical charts showed that there are 6 factors that are directly linked to high blood pressure: weight, age, family history of hypertension, amount of salt in diet, amount of exercise, and alcohol consumption. It seemed to me that weight and age may have been the factors most contributing to high blood pressure.
7. List risk factors associated with the hypertension. Based on your observation, which risk factor do you think is most closely associated with hypertension?
Please see last question.
8. What effect might obesity have on blood pressure? Does obesity alone cause a person to be at risk for high blood pressure? What other factors, in combination with obesity, might increase a person's risk for high blood pressure?
Again, please see above. Yes, obesity is a huge factor in blood pressure. I found that it could cause hypertension by itself. The other factors that can contribute are listed under question 6.