5,000 islanders do not know they have high blood pressure

The charity is using the milestone to re-emphasise to islanders over the age of 25 the importance of getting screened, which can be done at its centre near Oberlands.

Independent from the Princess Elizabeth Hospital and Health & Social Care, it relies solely on donations to meet its running costs of £130,000 a year.

Charity co-chairman Dr Stephen Brennand Roper said that initially Guernsey Chest & Heart had been set up as a screening unit in order to reduce the risk of heart attacks among the local population. It had slowly expanded over the years to cover other forms of cardiovascular disease.

‘It’s been a really successful set-up, in total there have been more than 80,000 screenings over the years, and we currently see about 40 people a week,’ he said.

The centre now includes four clinical screening rooms and offers a comprehensive check-up service, with patients’ height, weight, blood pressure, glucose and cholesterol levels all able to be measured.

An ECG to monitor a patients’ heart rhythm is also available.

Centre manager Caroline Ogier said that, in recent years, general awareness of health had seemingly improved among those visiting the centre, which she attributed to the impact of the Covid pandemic.

‘It was a strange time but it has definitely made people more switched on about their health and of more symptoms to do with different things,’ she said.

She added that the charity was constantly adapting and adjusting to the latest research which, as well as including traditionally well-recognised factors such as weight and diet, now acknowledged the impact of elements like stress and sleep quality on heart health.

‘Nowadays we find that people are a lot more open and honest about their general health and lifestyle, so the risk we are able to calculate and advice we can give is better because of that,’ she said.

‘It’s important to say that we aren’t here to judge. There are often many reasons for the way people live their lives and we are here to help.’

Co-chairwoman Sally-Ann David said that by the time people started exhibiting symptoms of heart problems it often meant that their condition was serious, which was why it was so important to get checked regularly.

‘About five million people in the UK have high blood pressure and don’t even know about it, and those stats are reflected in Guernsey too in terms of rate, so it would be around 5,000 people here,’ she said.

‘Even if we can’t help further than just a screening we aim to signpost people to other services should they need them. It’s quite a holistic approach.’

Mrs Ogier said that the charity's future plans all depended on the donations it received, but would include continued outreach into the community.

‘We’d love to be able to always offer more. For example it would be great to be able to test the blood pressure of those over 40 more regularly than once every five years, but it’s always a question of funding,’ she said.

‘We do get invited into workplaces and that helps us to address the common misconceptions about who we are, and how we are not connected to the PEH or HSC.

'If we can convince more people to come though the door and get checked then ultimately that’s what matters most.’

The charity celebrated the start of its 50th year with a reception at Government House with its patron Lt-General Richard Cripwell earlier this week.

n To find out more about the work that the Chest & Heart centre does, visit https://www.chestandheart.org.gg