National and Regional Trends in the Prevalence of Hypertension in South Korea Amid the Pandemic, 2009-2022: Nationwide Study of Over 3 Million Individuals

Hyeri Lee   ^{1, 2 *} , BS ;   Minji Kim   ^{1, 2 *} , MSc ;   Selin Woo   ¹ , PhD ;   Jaeyu Park   ^{1, 2} , MSc ;   Hyeon Jin Kim   ^{1, 2} , MSc ;   Rosie Kwon   ¹ , MSc ;   Ai Koyanagi   ³ , MD, PhD ;   Lee Smith   ⁴ , PhD ;   Min Seo Kim   ⁵ , MD ;   Guillermo F López Sánchez   ⁶ , PhD ;   Elena Dragioti   ^{7, 8} , PhD ;   Jinseok Lee   ⁹ , PhD ;   Hayeon Lee   ^{1, 9} , PhD ;   Masoud Rahmati   ^{10, 11, 12} , PhD ;   Sang Youl Rhee   ^{1, 2, 13} , MD, PhD ;   Jun Hyuk Lee   ¹⁴ , BS ;   Ho Geol Woo   ¹⁵ , MD, PhD ;   Dong Keon Yon   ^{1, 2, 16} , MD, PhD

¹ Center for Digital Health, Medical Science Research Institute, Kyung Hee University College of Medicine, Seoul, Republic of Korea

² Department of Regulatory Science, Kyung Hee University, Seoul, Republic of Korea

³ Research and Development Unit, Parc Sanitari Sant Joan de Deu, Barcelona, Spain

⁴ Centre for Health, Performance and Wellbeing, Anglia Ruskin University, Cambridge, United Kingdom

⁵ Cardiovascular Disease Initiative, Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, Cambridge, MA, United States

⁶ Division of Preventive Medicine and Public Health, Department of Public Health Sciences, School of Medicine, University of Murcia, Murcia, Spain

⁷ Pain and Rehabilitation Centre, Department of Medical and Health Sciences, Linköping University, Linköping, Sweden

⁸ Research Laboratory Psychology of Patients, Families & Health Professionals, Department of Nursing, School of Health Sciences, University of Ioannina, Ioannina, Greece

⁹ Department of Biomedical Engineering, Kyung Hee University, Yongin, Republic of Korea

¹⁰ Department of Physical Education and Sport Sciences, Faculty of Literature and Humanities, Vali-E-Asr University of Rafsanjan, Rafsanjan, Iran

¹¹ Department of Physical Education and Sport Sciences, Faculty of Literature and Human Sciences, Lorestan University, Khoramabad, Iran

¹² Research Centre on Health Services and Quality of Life, Aix Marseille University, Marseille, France

¹³ Department of Endocrinology and Metabolism, Kyung Hee University School of Medicine, Seoul, Republic of Korea

¹⁴ Health and Human Science, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA, United States

¹⁵ Department of Neurology, Kyung Hee University Medical Center, Kyung Hee University College of Medicine, Seoul, Republic of Korea

¹⁶ Department of Pediatrics, Kyung Hee University College of Medicine, Seoul, Republic of Korea

*these authors contributed equally