If your thoughts regularly wander when you need to focus, or if you forget where you put your phone several times a day, you may find yourself wondering if your memory is failing and what the potential causes could be. While there are many reasons for this, ranging from trivial to extremely serious, your blood pressure could be the culprit. This is because blood pressure directly affects how well your brain functions. And, because your blood delivers nutrients and oxygen to your brain, when blood flow is affected you may notice subtle changes in cognition and mental capacity.  

In this article, we will discuss the complex relationship between blood pressure and brain function, as well as what you can do to ensure that your brain stays healthier for longer.

If you are worried about your memory or mental health, always seek advice from a medical professional. 

Sudden confusion and memory lapses could be symptoms of stroke or hypertensive emergency. If you are experiencing worrisome symptoms involving brain function.

– call 999 immediately.

Blood pressure and brain fog

Most people have experienced brain fog at some point in their life. Perhaps you felt disengaged with a task at work and had a hard time maintaining focus, or you didn’t sleep well and couldn’t think as clearly the next morning. But what happens when brain fog becomes a daily occurrence? Several factors can contribute to brain fog, but abnormal blood pressure can be overlooked as a possible cause.

Your brain accounts for only 2% of your body weight but gets a 20% share of your body’s total oxygen. This means that when blood flow is affected, oxygen delivery is also significantly impacted and you may notice that it’s harder to accomplish even basic day-to-day activities.

If you’re experiencing brain fog, as well as considering other causes it’s a good idea to check your blood pressure. If it’s within normal limits you can rule it out as an issue. However, if it’s too high (hypertension) or too low (hypotension) it might be worth discussing blood pressure management with a healthcare professional. In addition, you’ll also address any health issues that are related to high or low blood pressure, such as heart attacks, stroke or fainting. Managing abnormal blood pressure is a win-win situation.

However, while measuring blood pressure is always a good thing, just bear in mind that only measuring your blood pressure while at the doctor’s, or in a healthcare setting, gives you data at that single time-point. And it’s well-known that blood pressure measurements taken in a medical setting can give elevated, or erroneous, data due to white coat syndrome. In addition, fluctuations in blood pressure can be perfectly normal, so continuous monitoring of blood pressure through a wearable device can give you a better understanding of what your blood pressure is actually doing day and night, as well as over a longer period such as a week, month or year.

High blood pressure and cognitive decline

Several studies point to hypertension as a major factor in cognitive decline, particularly for vascular dementia. 

One study by researchers at Harvard looked at healthy elderly participants who lived in an assisted living community. They found an association between elevated blood pressure and impairment in executive function, which is a person’s ability to focus, control their impulses and emotions, think through a task, and remember key items. But hypertension isn’t only an issue for the elderly. An increasing body of evidence is showing that control of blood pressure in mid-life can play a significant role in whether individuals develop dementia in later life. 

While blood pressure is the key factor, the medical issues that can cause hypertension also need to be considered. For example, obesity is a significant risk factor and researchers have shown that while hypertension and obesity in their own right resulted in lower cognitive function in male individuals, the combination of obesity with hypertension had an even larger impact. The same is true for kidney disease, where the same abnormalities of blood vessels in the brain were seen in both patients with kidney disease and patients with dementia. Importantly, a key risk factor for kidney disease is hypertension. 

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Blood pressure and memory

Researchers at Johns Hopkins University in the US recently disclosed the results from a long-term study that evaluated 15,000 participants over 25 years. They found a strong correlation between high blood pressure and memory loss, and participants with high blood pressure in midlife showed a 6.5% sharper decline in memory and cognition by the time they had reached old age than those with normal blood pressure. 

However, when people were diagnosed with hypertension in midlife and took steps to control their blood pressure, they fared much better on cognitive tests in old age.

Abnormal Blood Pressure May Cause Attention Deficits

Alongside impacts up-on brain function and memory, there is also evidence that abnormal blood pressure may reduce our ability to focus. One study even found that the deficits in focus were more pronounced in women than men, although they stated that the reduced performance in speed and psychomotor coordination were not enough to intrude on everyday activities. 

Of course, more research is needed to confirm the connection, but it may be worth keeping an eye on your blood pressure if you notice any changes in focus or attention span throughout the day.

Impact on visuospatial abilities 

Visuospatial awareness is a key skill required to identify where objects are in space and in relation to each other. Abnormal blood pressure can alter your visuospatial perception, distorting your judgment of where people and objects are.

Why does that matter? Impaired visuospatial skills can lead to difficulties such as:

• Tripping and falling due to inability to judge where obstacles are
• Poor hand-eye coordination
• Distorted depth perception
• Trouble recognizing faces
• Difficulty with everyday tasks like reading

Hypertension can lead to a decline in visuospatial awareness, and those with blood pressure in the normal range, or taking medication for hypertension, had significantly better visuospatial, executive, attention, abstraction, memory, and recall Montreal Cognitive Assessment scores than individuals with hypertension.

Keeping Your Brain Young

Blood flow to the brain affects how much oxygen and nutrients are available for your brain to use. And just like a delivery truck gets stuck in a traffic jam, if your blood flow is impaired, your brain might not have the supplies it needs to do its job.

Exercise can help improve blood flow to the brain. It can also release endorphins, your feel-good hormones, and help manage stress. Exercise can also be a good way to ensure that your blood pressure stays within a healthy range, by increasing heart strength, which in turn means that your heart can pump blood with less effort and blood pressure reduces. 

Final Thoughts

There is a lot of overlap between what contributes to declining cognitive performance and what contributes to high blood pressure. Smoking, drinking excessively, eating a lot of processed food, and not exercising can all affect cognitive performance and blood pressure. So, making adjustments toward living a healthy lifestyle can help you take care of your brain and your cardiovascular health, all at once.

Knowing that you have hypertension means that you can take steps to control it. And controlling blood pressure will reduce your risk of developing brain-related diseases in later life. However, while an estimated 1 in 3 adults in the UK have hypertension, half of people with high blood pressure are not diagnosed or receiving treatment. This is where continually measuring your blood pressure with a Hilo Band can really make a difference. 

Disclaimer: This article is for informational purposes only and does not contain medical advice, and is not a replacement for medical advice. The information in this article is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease. Talk to a qualified medical professional before making any changes to your health regimen.

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