Comparison of Childhood Hypertension Guidelines

Abstract

Hypertension (HT) is seen with increasing frequency in childhood. Various guidelines have been published to better evaluate these patients. The most frequently used of these are; The 4 th Report (The 4 th Report-2004) updated and published by the National Heart Lung and Blood Institute (NHLBI) National High Blood Pressure Education (NHBPEP) Working Group in 2004, a guideline prepared by the European Society of Hypertension in 2016 (ESH-2016), the last one is the guideline prepared by the American Academy of Pediatrics in 2017 (AAP-2017). Although these guidelines have some similarities, there are serious differences between them. The 4 th Report-2004 and ESH-2016 guidelines use blood pressure (BP) percentile tables based on age and height previously determined in American children. Then, new tables were created by extracting the measurements of obese children and these tables were used in AAP-2017. From the age of 16 in ESH-2016 and 13 in AAP-2017, it is recommended that BP evaluations should be made according to adult guidelines. Evaluation of the