Ron’s Wanderings

Today I’d like to start a series of articles about something that is so prevalent in our world today — blood pressure. These articles will focus on both high blood pressure and low blood pressure.

This first article will focus on something that about 80 million Americans suffer from — high blood pressure — or what the doctors call hypertension. What is sad is that almost 30 percent of the people who have high blood pressure don’t know they have it. What’s even more interesting is that the rest don’t know what to do about it or don’t care to do anything about it.

High blood pressure has come to be know as the “silent killer”. As I mentioned above, someone can have hypertension for years — and unless someone takes that person’s blood pressure, they won’t know they have it. You would think they would know, but the signs that DO indicate the problem — dizziness, headaches, nose bleeds — are often attributed to other ailments.

The reason why high blood pressure can be a “silent killer” is that the physical symptoms, like those mentioned, don’t usually show up until the hypertension is in more advanced stages — and those stages can be life-threatening. Some of the other symptoms can be an ache in the back of the neck in the morning, excessive perspiration, muscle cramps, muscle weakness, frequent urination and a rapid or irregular heartbeat.

What’s the answer to this? That’s easy — check your blood pressure often — so that you will know early on if you’re developing this problem. If you’re aware of it, you can cut back on fatty, high cholesterol foods and improve your overall lifestyle.

What is hypertension, anyway?

Blood pressure refers to the force created in the arteries when the heart beats (systolic pressure) and when the heart rests (diastolic pressure). It is often determined by the amount of blood pumped by your heart and the amount of resistance to blood flow in your arteries that your body exhibits. One must remember that blood pressure varies. It increases during activities, especially strenuous ones and decreases when at rest.

High blood pressure on its own is not actually life threatening. It is the conditions that arise from the high blood pressure that pose serious health risks.

Just keep in mind that doing regular measurements is vital. If you have high blood pressure you have an increased risk for acquiring coronary heart disease which may lead to heart attack and stroke. Though people of all ages can have high blood pressure, the condition is more common on people over the age of 35 years old.

If you are obese or are a heavy drinker, you have a higher risk for hypertension. Women who take birth control pills are also more likely to develop high blood pressure as compared to women who do not. High blood pressure also runs in families. If you have diabetes, gout, or kidney disease, you are also at a higher risk.

The main point of this first article in the series, is to emphasize the importance of getting your blood pressure checked regularly. Go to the local drug store and purchase a blood pressure cuff so you can do it yourself. As you know, if you do visit your health professional, they always take your blood pressure — and they do that for all the reasons mentioned here.
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Got questions?

Contact me at: http://www.ronrink.com

My email and phone number are at that site. Feel free to contact me. I’m here to help you with your health, nutrition and fitness goals.

Have a healthy and nutritious day!

Shanti … (A sanscrit word meaning, “Let there be Peace. Peace, beautiful Peace. Peace within, Peace without. Peace in this world. Peace for all beings.”)

Ron

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This entry was posted on Friday, January 5th, 2007 at 9:55 am and is filed under Nutrition and Weight Loss. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.