Studies on the prevalence of hypertension in Iraqi rural and urban communities

A blood pressure study was conducted on samples of Iraqi rural and urban communities. The prevalence of hypertension among the examined population over the age of 15 years was 12.3 and 9.5% for the urban and rural populations respectively. Increase in age and adiposity was accompanied by a progressive rise in the prevalence of hypertension. Only 19.2% of the hypertensives detected were aware of their condition prior to the survey and of those only 37.5% were on regular treatment