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New guidelines for classifying hypertension in children are based on normative tables but parallel those in adults. Hypertension is now classified into one of two stages based on severity, and a new prehypertension category has been created. To determine prevalence, a cross-sectional sample of 6790 children aged 11 to 17 in one large school system had blood pressure (BP) measured. Measurement was repeated on two subsequent occasions if the mean of three baseline readings was elevated.
For all or most measurements, prehypertension was defined as mean systolic BP (SBP) or diastolic BP (DBP) ≥90th percentile; stage 1 hypertension was defined as mean SBP or DBP ≥95th percentile; and stage 2 was defined as >99th percentile +5 mm Hg. At the initia…