Reducing blood pressure and saving lives
More than 122 million people — nearly half of Americans age 20 years and up have high blood pressure, and most don’t know it. This is why our primary care practice is dedicated to reducing patients’ high blood pressure and saving lives.
For the second year in a row, UT Health Physicians has been awarded the Target: BP Gold+ designation by the American Heart Association and the American Medical Association for improving patients' blood pressure and helping decrease their risk of heart attack and stroke.
“The Target: BP program celebrates practices and health systems that treat patients with hypertension for achieving blood pressure control rates at or above 70% within the populations they serve. Blood pressure control ultimately leads to a reduction in the number of patients who suffer heart attacks and strokes,” said Ramon Cancino, MD, MBA, MS, FAAFP, executive director of the primary care center at UT Health Physicians. “Our entire primary care center team is extremely proud to have earned the highest possible Gold+ recognition and to have been the only practice in San Antonio to do so. Our patients benefit from the effort our entire team has put into this program.”
Why should you care about your blood pressure?
High blood pressure can lead to serious health issues, including heart attack, stroke, heart failure and even death.
Determining if you have high blood pressure can be difficult as there are often no symptoms. But you can find out if your blood pressure is higher than normal by checking it yourself or by having it checked regularly by your healthcare provider.
Very high blood pressure can cause symptoms. These include headaches, changes in vision, or chest pain.
Decreasing high blood pressure in our patient community
To combat heart disease in our community, our providers closely monitor patients’ blood pressure and work to reduce their risk of heart attack or stroke.
“Blood pressure checks are often seen as a routine part of a doctor’s visit, but at UT Health Physicians, we keep it at the forefront of our minds with an additional focus on hypertension control. In primary care, we not only check at a patient’s regular visit, but we also monitor if a patient is overdue for a check. We take the added step of closely monitoring our patients who see specialists and have suboptimal blood pressure. All this is in an effort to help our patients live longer and healthier lives,” said David Cadena, MD, FAAFP, UT Health Hill Country medical director.
When patients visit UT Health San Antonio’s primary care physicians, they have a team of health care professionals working together to identify red flags, prevent problems and manage chronic conditions.
UT Health San Antonio is a designated Patient-Centered Medical Home (PCMH). This means our primary care patients have access to an extensive network of specialists and, in this case, board-certified cardiologists who can work with a patient's established care team to provide specialized, coordinated care.
To make an appointment at any of our primary care locations, visit UTHealthCare.org/primarycare.
To learn more about Target: BP, click here.