Benefits | Blood Pressure Interventions

Health benefits for blood pressure screening and control^1-5

Employee health benefits are part of an overall compensation package and affect an employee’s willingness to seek preventive services and clinical care.

Provide coverage for blood pressure screening, counseling, and treatment for employees

• The United States Preventive Services Task Force and the Joint National Committee on Prevention, Detection, Evaluation, and Treatment of High Blood Pressure (JNC7) recommends: 
  • Clinicians screen adults aged 18 and older for high blood pressure
• Blood pressure should be measured in every clinical encounter. Since this is a routine intake assessment in outpatient settings, providing coverage at every preventive care visit per year will ensure regular employee screening in clinical settings
• If high blood pressures is detected, coverage for the following will enhance clinical care: ◦Counseling to promote therapeutic lifestyle changes
  • Office visits to monitor hypertension and treatment efforts
  • Medications used to treat hypertension
• For individuals who have been diagnosed with high blood pressure, disease management programs are recommended to improve hypertension care. Disease management is an organized, proactive, multicomponent approach to health care delivery for specific diseases such as high blood pressure. Disease management programs involve tracking and monitoring individuals with high blood pressure by a coordinated care team to prevent complications and the development of co-morbid conditions such as diabetes
• The health-related benefits strategies and interventions listed for physical activity, alcohol use, nutrition, stress, type 2 diabetes, and obesity include major lifestyle activities recommended to control blood pressure

Tools and Resources

• The National Business Group for Health’s A Purchaser’s Guide to Clinical Preventive Services: Moving Science into Coverage [PDF – 13KB] provides benefits package language for clinical screening plus six counseling, treatment, and monitoring sessions per calendar year for employees with diagnosed high blood pressure
• Blood Pressure and Its Relationship to Stroke fact sheet developed by the American Stroke Association includes treatment guidelines for prehypertension
• Cardiac Medications fact sheet developed by the American Heart Association describes the major types of medications for high blood pressure