Millions to get NHS blood pressure checks at the barbers and supermarket to prevent silent killers
MEN will get free blood pressure checks at barbershops under NHS plans.
The tests could help prevent thousands of heart attacks every year by spotting signs of hypertension early, health chiefs say.
It comes as new research shows men have double the risk of heart attack compared to women.
Dr Tiberiu Pana, of the University of Aberdeen, said: “Men should start looking early at risk factors, like obesity, lack of exercise, smoking, alcohol consumption.
“The earlier the better. There’s no harm in minimising your cardiovascular risk.”
There are 100,000 hospital admissions due to heart attacks every year in the UK – one every five minutes.
Around a quarter of Brits have high blood pressure, which significantly increases their risk of heart attack.
The NHS has doubled the number of blood pressure checks it offers to people over 40 in the last year, new figures reveal today.
Officials have now green lit a huge expansion of the scheme to offer the checks in a wider range of locations across local communities in an effort to spot high blood pressure early.
Under the plans, patients will now be able to access the potentially lifesaving checks in barbershops, supermarkets mosques and dominoes clubs.
A further 2.5 million blood pressure checks will also be given in community pharmacies.
It comes as new research, presented at the European Society of Cardiology in Amsterdam, showed men are at significantly greater risk of heart attacks than women.
More than 20,000 men and women in the UK aged over 40 were tracked between 1993 and 2018.
Researchers also adjusted for a range of factors including ethnicity, deprivation, BMI, physical activity, alcohol intake and smoking status.
On average, people in the study were followed up for 22 years.
Compared to women, the relative risk for men of experiencing heart attacks and peripheral artery disease was two-fold higher.
They also had a 50 per cent higher risk of heart failure and atrial fibrillation.
The study suggested men have a 42 per cent higher risk of dying from cardiovascular disease.
Dr Sonya Babu-Narayan, of the British Heart Foundation, said: “This large study again highlights that men more commonly have heart attacks at a younger age than women.
“Coronary heart disease is the most common killer of men. There’s never been a better time to get physically active and replace that pub session with an extra session in the gym.”