Hypertension In Dogs and Cats
Compend Contin Educ Pract Vet. May 2004;26(5):336-346. 43 Refs
Mark J. Acierno, Mary Anna Labato

The veterinary community has been slow to embrace the practice of routine screening for hypertension despite the realization that persistent elevations in blood pressure can have serious and even life-threatening consequences. This reluctance has been attributable to the absence of a standard definition of hypertension as well as confusion about which indirect blood pressure measurement techniques are accurate. There has also been little consensus on how to determine which patients are at risk of developing hypertension and how to develop an effective treatment protocol. This article presents a rational approach to identifying patients at risk, methods of accurately measuring blood pressure in the clinical setting, and recommendations for treatment.