NHS Choices has conducted an assessment of a report in the Daily Mail that people with high blood pressure may be twice as likely to develop a brain tumour.

The report is based on a study funded by the World Cancer Research Fund International and published in the Journal of Hypertension. The study followed over half a million Norwegian, Swedish and Austrian people for an average of about 10 years, looking at how several factors related to their risk of developing a brain tumour. After dividing people into five bands according to their blood pressure, the researchers found that people with the highest 20% of blood pressure readings were between 45% and 84% more likely to have a brain tumour. However, they found that having high blood pressure while the heart is at rest was only associated with an 18% risk increase once adjustments were made to account for other factors, such as age, gender and smoking status. After these adjustments, there was no increased risk for people who had higher systolic blood pressure.

The assessment notes that news sources were correct to highlight that this study did not show that high blood pressure causes brain tumours although some of the statistics they quoted may be misinterpreted, It concludes “while some news sources have suggested that high blood pressure is associated with a doubling in risk for brain tumours, most of the study’s results suggested the associated risk was much lower. Brain tumours were also still extremely uncommon in the group, regardless of the subject’s blood pressure. This study has various other limitations and is a single study, which means that further study is warranted.”