Australian study finds link between snoring, elevated blood pressure

An Australian study has found a link between snoring and elevated blood pressure. According to the study, which was conducted by sleep scientists from Flinders University in South Australia, people who regularly snore at night are more likely to have elevated blood pressure and uncontrolled hypertension.

Hypertension occurs when the pressure in a person's blood vessels is too high. It can cause serious damage to the heart and lead to heart attack, stroke, heart failure and heart disease.

The study found that 15 percent of 12,287 participants snored for more than 20 percent of the night on average over a six-month monitoring period and that those with high snoring levels had a 3.8 mmHg higher systolic blood pressure and 4.5 mmHg higher diastolic blood pressure than participants who did not snore.

The Flinders University study was the first to use multiple night home-based monitoring technologies over a prolonged period to investigate the link between snoring and hypertension. The participants in the study were middle-aged and 88 percent were male.

"For the first time, we can objectively say that there is a significant connection between regular nighttime snoring and high blood pressure," Bastien Lechat, lead author of the research from the College of Medicine and Public Health at Flinders University, said in a media release on Wednesday.

"These results emphasize the significance of considering snoring as a factor in healthcare and treatment for sleep-related issues, especially in the context of managing hypertension."

The World Health Organization estimates that 1.28 billion adults aged 30-79 years worldwide have hypertension and that 46 percent of adults with hypertension are unaware they have the condition.