NHS: High Blood Pressure (Symptoms, Checks and When to Get Help)

Tier 1: Established: peer-reviewed research or government health authority
Publisher: NHS (UK National Health Service) · Published: September 18, 2026 · Accessed: September 18, 2026

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Claims this source supports

• High blood pressure is very common, especially in older adults, and there are usually no symptoms, so a person may not realise they have it.
• The only way to find out if you have high blood pressure is to get your blood pressure checked.
• NHS guidance: get your blood pressure checked at a pharmacy or GP surgery if you are aged 40 or over and have not had it checked for more than five years, or if you think you might have, or be at risk of, high blood pressure.
• Risk factors named by the NHS include increasing age, close relatives with high blood pressure, Black African, Black Caribbean or South Asian ethnicity, an unhealthy or high-salt diet, being overweight, smoking, drinking too much alcohol, and long-term stress.
• A blood pressure test involves inflating a cuff around the upper arm and measuring the pressure in the blood vessels.
• Chest pain that does not go away, or that spreads to the arm, neck, jaw, stomach or back, and comes with sweating, sickness, light-headedness or shortness of breath, is an emergency: NHS guidance is to call 999.