9 Tips to prevent High Blood Pressure
Blood pressure is the force of your blood pushing against the walls of your arteries. Each time your heart beats, it pumps blood into the arteries. Your blood pressure is highest when your heart beats, pumping the blood. This is called systolic pressure. When your heart is at rest, between beats, your blood pressure falls. This is called diastolic pressure.
Your blood pressure reading uses these two numbers. Usually the systolic number comes before or above the diastolic number. For example, 120/80 means a systolic of 120 and a diastolic of 80.
Many of those people don’t know they have it, because there are usually no warning signs. This can be dangerous, because high blood pressure can lead to life-threatening conditions like heart attack or stroke. The good news is that you can often prevent or treat high blood pressure. Early diagnosis and heart-healthy lifestyle changes can keep high blood pressure from seriously damaging your health.
Tip 1: Eat Healthy
Fill your plate with fruits, vegetables, whole grains, low-fat dairy, beans, skinless poultry and lean meats, and fatty fish.
You do not need to achieve this balance with every meal, but try to get the balance right over a day or even a week. Fruits and vegetables should make up over a third of the food we eat each day.
Tip 2: Get Active
If you have heart disease or any other health problem, talk with your doctor before you start exercising. If you’re new to exercise or haven’t exercised in a long time, start slowly, doing just a little bit at a time. Eventually, you want to do aerobic exercise, like running, biking, swimming, or brisk walking, for 30 minutes most days of the week.
5 best exercises to control high blood pressure
- moderate walking three times a day
- 10-minute cycling
- Desk tread milling or pedal pushing
- weight training or lifting can reduce blood pressure
- Swimming
Tip 3: Watch Your Weight
To stay at a healthy weight, balance the calories you eat and drink with the calories you burn (use up). Calories are a measure of the energy in the foods you eat. To lose weight, you need to burn more calories than you eat.
A healthy diet and physical activity can help you control your weight. If you’re overweight, even just a small amount of weight loss (like losing 5% of your body weight) can improve your blood pressure.
Tips to help you lose weight
- Choose foods high in fiber.
- choose whole-grain instead of processed starches
- Limit serving size
- Cook rice, pasta and hot cereals without salt
Tip 4: Manage stress
Stress is part of being human, and it can help motivate you to get things done. Stress can raise your blood pressure, so find ways to unwind. Exercising and getting enough sleep can help relieve tension. Or try taking 15 minutes of quiet time every day to relax.
- Keep a positive attitude.
- Accept that there are events that you cannot control.
- Be assertive instead of aggressive. Assert your feelings, opinions, or beliefs instead of becoming angry, defensive, or passive.
- Learn to manage your time more effectively.
- Set limits appropriately and say no to requests that would create excessive stress in your life.
- Make time for hobbies and interests.
Tip 5: Avoid Tobacco Smoke
The nicotine in cigarette smoke is a big part of the problem. It raises your blood pressure and heart rate, narrows your arteries and hardens their walls, and makes your blood more likely to clot. It stresses your heart and sets you up for a heart attack or stroke
- Make a list of activities you can do instead of smoking. Save it on your phone, so it’s handy.
- When you get the urge for a cigarette, take a deep breath. Hold it for a moment, and then slowly exhale. Do this a few times, until the urge to smoke passes.
- Take a walk or read a book instead of a cigarette break.
- When you can, avoid places, people, and situations that make you want to smoke.
- When you crave cigarettes, eat low-calorie foods (such as carrot or celery sticks, or sugar-free hard candies) or chew sugar-free gum.
- Limit drinks that have alcohol or caffeine. They can trigger urges to smoke.
Tip 6: Follow directions for prescription medications
Your doctor has many high blood pressure medications to choose from. They work in different ways to lower your blood pressure. Each type of drug has its own possible side effects, so it’s a good idea to know exactly which high blood pressure medicines you take.
Don’t run out of pills for even one day.
If you have side effects, tell your doctor. Different people can respond very differently to medications. Everyone has to go through a trial period to find out which medications work best with the fewest side effects. Give yourself a chance to adjust to a drug.
Tip 7: Limit your alcohol intake
If you have high blood pressure, avoid alcohol or drink alcohol only in moderation. For healthy adults, that means up to one drink a day for women and up to two drinks a day for men.
Keep in mind that alcohol contains calories and may contribute to unwanted weight gain — a risk factor for high blood pressure Also, alcohol can interact with certain blood pressure medications, affecting the level of the medication in your body or increasing side effects.
Tip 8: Eat less salt (sodium)
Salt intake of less than 5 grams per day for adults helps to reduce blood pressure and risk of cardiovascular disease, stroke and coronary heart attack.
Salt raises your blood pressure. The more salt you eat, the higher your blood pressure. Aim to eat less than 6g of salt a day, which is about a teaspoonful.
Tip 9:Go for regular checkups
Regular health checks can identify any early signs of health issues. Finding problems early means that your chances for effective treatment are increased.
When you have a health check, your doctor will talk with you about your medical history, your family’s history of disease and your lifestyle, including your diet, weight, physical activity, alcohol use and whether you smoke.
Tests for diabetes include a fasting blood sugar level test, which measures the amount of glucose in the blood after fasting (not eating for an amount of time). It is usually done before you have breakfast. Depending on your risk level, you will need to be tested annually or once every 2 years.