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International Journal of Population Studies

RESEARCH ARTICLE

Diagnosis and control of hypertension in

the elderly populations of Japan and the

United States

3
4
Yasuhiko Saito 1,2* , Shieva Davarian , Atsuhiko Takahashi , Edward Schneid-
5
5
er and Eileen M. Crimmins
1 University Research Center, Nihon University, 12-5 Gobancho, Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo, 102-8251,
Japan
2 School of Medicine, Nihon University, 30-1 Ooyaguchi Kamicho, Itabashi-ku, Tokyo,
173-8610, Japan
3 Orange County Social Services Agency, 500 N. State College Blvd., Orange, CA 92868, USA
4 Department of Food and Nutrition, Advanced Course of Food and Nutrition, Junior College,
Nihon University, 2-31-145 Bunkyo-cho, Mishima-shi, Shizuoka, 411-8555, Japan
5 Davis School of Gerontology, University of Southern California, 3715 McClintock Ave. Los
Angeles, CA 90089-0191, USA

Abstract: The Japanese have the highest life expectancy in the world while the United States
(U.S.) has relatively low life expectancy. Furthermore, the Americans have relatively poorer
health compared to the Japanese. Examination of the treatment of specific conditions such as
hypertension in these two countries may provide insights into how the health care system con-
tributes to the relative health in these two countries. In this study, we focus on the treatment of
hypertension, as this is the most common condition requiring therapeutic interventions in se-
niors. This study examines hypertension diagnoses and controls in nationally representative
samples of the older populations (68 years old or older) of Japan and the U.S. Data come from
two nationally representative samples: the Nihon University Japanese Longitudinal Study of
Aging (NUJLSOA) (n = 2,309) and the U.S. Health and Retirement (HRS) Study (n = 3,517).
The overall prevalence of hypertension is higher in Japan than the U.S. Undiagnosed hyperten-
sion is about four times higher in Japan than in the U.S., while the control of blood pressure is
more than four times higher in the U.S. than in Japan. Thus, the use of antihypertensive medi-
cation is much more frequent and more effective in the U.S. The medical care system seems to
be more effective in controlling hypertension in the U.S. than in Japan. This may be due to the
more aggressive diagnosis and treatment of hypertension in the U.S.
Keywords: control, diagnosis, hypertension, public health, older adults
Copyright: © 2015 Yasuhiko Saito, et
al. This is an Open Access article dis-
tributed under the terms of the Creative *Correspondence to: Yasuhiko Saito, University Research Center, Nihon University, 12-5 Gobancho, Chi-
Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 yoda-ku, Tokyo, 102-8251, Japan; Email: saito.yasuhiko@nihon-u.ac.jp
International License (http://creative-
commons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), per- Received: April 24, 2015; Accepted: June 13, 2015; Published Online: June 21, 2015
mitting all non-commercial use, distribu-
tion, and reproduction in any medium, Citation: Saito Y, Davarian S, Takahashi A, et al. (2015). Diagnosis and control of hypertension in the
provided the original work is properly elderly populations of Japan and the United States. International Journal of Population Studies, vol.1(1):
cited. 19–28. http://dx.doi.org/10.18063/IJPS.2015.01.008

International Journal of Population Studies | 2015, Volume 1, Issue 1 19