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Causes
By Mayo Clinic staffWhen you stand up, gravity causes blood to pool in your legs. This decreases blood pressure because there's less blood circulating back to your heart to pump. Normally, special cells (baroreceptors) next to your heart and neck arteries sense this lower blood pressure and counteract it by triggering your heart to beat faster and pump more blood, which stabilizes blood pressure. In addition, these cells cause blood vessels to narrow, which increases resistance to blood flow and increases blood pressure.
Orthostatic or postural hypotension occurs when something interrupts the body's natural process of counteracting low blood pressure. Orthostatic hypotension can be caused by many different things, including:
- Dehydration. Fever, vomiting, not drinking enough fluids, severe diarrhea and strenuous exercise can all lead to dehydration. When you become dehydrated, your body loses more water, and often sodium, than you take in. Even mild dehydration can cause weakness, dizziness and fatigue.
- Heart problems. Some heart conditions that can lead to low blood pressure include extremely low heart rate (bradycardia), heart valve problems, heart attack and heart failure. These conditions may cause orthostatic hypotension because they prevent your body from being able to circulate enough blood.
- Diabetes. Untreated diabetes can cause dehydration by causing frequent urination. This can trigger orthostatic hypotension. In addition, diabetes can damage the nerves that help send signals regulating blood pressure.
- Nervous system disorders. Some diseases, such as Parkinson's disease, multiple system atrophy (Shy-Drager syndrome) and amyloidosis, can disrupt your body's normal blood pressure regulation system.
- Your high blood pressure questions answered: Low blood pressure. American Heart Association. http://www.americanheart.org/presenter.jhtml?identifier=3034848. Accessed April 14, 2009.
- Hypotension. National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute. http://www.nhlbi.nih.gov/health/dci/Diseases/hyp/hyp_whatis.html. Accessed April 14, 2009.
- Sheps SG, ed. Mayo Clinic 5 Steps to Controlling High Blood Pressure. Rochester, Minn.: Mayo Foundation for Medical Education and Research; 2008.
- Kaufmann H, et al. Mechanisms and causes of orthostatic and postprandial hypotension. http://www.uptodate.com/home/index.html. Accessed April 6, 2009.
- Kaufmann H, et al. Treatment of orthostatic and postprandial hypotension. http://www.uptodate.com/home/index.html. Accessed April 6, 2009.
- Krediet CTP, et al. Management of initial orthostatic hypotension: lower body muscle tensing attenuates the transient arterial blood pressure decrease upon standing from squatting. Clinical Science. 2007;113:407.
