16 July 2026
Thousands of Australian children could be living with high blood pressure without anyone knowing, prompting the release of Australia's first national guideline for identifying and managing childhood hypertension.
The Australian Guideline for the Identification and Management of Hypertension in Children and Adolescents, published in the RACP’s Journal of Paediatrics and Child Health provides Australian clinicians with the country's first nationally consistent framework for identifying and managing hypertension in children and adolescents.
The guideline warns that children with blood pressure in the high-normal or hypertensive range face around double the risk of fatal or non-fatal cardiovascular events in adulthood, and more again when looking at events before people’s mid-40s. There is a strong relationship with early kidney disease and other events such as childhood stroke.
Lead author Dr Nicholas Larkins said the guideline reflects growing evidence that cardiovascular health begins in childhood and that identifying children at risk earlier provides an opportunity to prevent lifelong disease.
“Most people think high blood pressure is something you worry about in your 50s or 60s. But for many Australians, the foundations are laid down in childhood. That's why identifying high blood pressure early is important, because it gives us the chance to change a child's health trajectory before organ damage and other risk factors, such as overweight and obesity, become established.
"Parents reading this shouldn't panic, but they should know that high blood pressure isn't just an adult condition. And now we’ve got guidelines to help prevent kids heart health from slipping through the cracks.
“Around 1 in 11 children will have an elevated BP reading. For most children this is a sign to initiate proactive lifestyle measures that we know can improve outcomes. For a smaller number of children (estimated 20,000-40,000), this will mean detecting and acting on target organ injury, such thickening of the heart, and finding out if there are any underlying causes that need specific treatments, such as undiagnosed kidney disease.”
“Hypertension is one of the leading modifiable risk factors for chronic disease and avoidable death worldwide, yet until now Australia has had no unified guideline for identifying and managing hypertension in children and adolescents.
“These guidelines respond to increasing rates of childhood hypertension alongside rising obesity, while also recognising the higher burden experienced by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children and adolescents.”
“Rather than recommending annual blood pressure checks, as occur in other countries, which would be difficult to implement, the guideline provides practical recommendations for clinicians. This includes routine blood pressure screening for all children at approximately 7-9 years of age and again at 13-15 years of age. For children at increased risk, such as those living with obesity, born prematurely, or taking stimulant medications, blood pressure measured more often.”
The guideline has been endorsed by the Royal Australasian College of Physicians, the National Heart Foundation of Australia, Hypertension Australia, Kidney Health Australia, the Cardiac Society of Australia and New Zealand, the Australia and New Zealand Paediatric Nephrology Association, and the Australia New Zealand Paediatric Obesity Network.