The Causes of High Blood Pressure and How You Can Control Them

The Causes of High Blood Pressure and How You Can Control Them:


Hypertension is a condition that is often called the "silent killer", and with good reason. Despite being a major factor in the cause of death among at least 300,000 people per year in the United States alone, it produces very few symptoms. The only way to know if you're suffering from it is to visit a doctors office.

Now that we know how serious the problem is, we might ask the question, what causes high blood pressure? The factors involved can be divided into two groups: those things you can't control, and lifestyle choices you can change. Let's take a brief look at things you can't control first.

Well it turns out there are more than a few factors we simply can't control. There are a couple of big ones-like age and race. As we age we're more likely to have hypertension. African Americans are also more likely to suffer from the condition. But we can't change our age or our ancestry. Beyond these two characteristics, plain old heredity may be one of the biggest factors. Some people just don't have the genes for good blood pressure-and no matter what they do they're going to have problems. So for some people, prescription medications are going to be a necessity.

However, it turns out that there are several lifestyle choices that may help you stay off prescription drugs. The first item to note is that smoking causes high blood pressure. If you're trying to quit because you're worried about lung cancer, you might also consider that smoking causes problems in your blood vessels that can lead to strokes and heart attacks.

Next on the list of lifestyle factors is being overweight. While not true in all cases, on average being overweight often causes high blood pressure or is at least a major contributing factor. In fact, if you're suffering from mild hypertension and you're overweight, before you start popping pills your doctor gives you consider the effect that losing 10-15 pounds might have on your health. In many cases, that's all that's needed to get rid of a blood pressure problem. Staying off strong medications ought to be a motivator to loose weight.

And related to this problem is-and you've probably guess it already-exercise. Being physically active is a huge factor in keeping your cardiovascular system healthy. By adding some regular exercise to your routine, you can help control your hypertension without drugs.

Its also thought that a lack of potassium and other vital nutrients causes high blood pressure. Recent studies have shown that adding potassium and other vital nutrients to the diet, if its done the right way, can have a dramatic effect on blood pressure.
Other important nutrients include Vitamin D, magnesium, calcium, and possibly even unsaturated fats. Despite having relatively low-cost, high-quality food available, many of us are actually deficient in these nutrients.

To summarize, if you're wondering what causes high blood pressure and how much we can control it, by focusing on smoking, body weight, exercise, and important minerals in the diet, we can get on the road to health.