Tips lowering high blood pressure (hypertension) naturally

If hypertension is allowed to be unchecked, it can damage brain, heart, blood vessels, and kidney in the long term. Fortunately, hypertension can be avoided without medication. One way to avoid it is to maintain ideal body weight, and then do the followings:

1. Do physical exercise
Regular exercise can reduce high blood pressure. It also helps the heart use oxygen more efficiently so that the heart will not too hard to pump blood. If you suffer from high blood pressure, choose a light exercise such as walking, cycling, relaxed running, and swimming. Perform walking regularly can lower blood pressure up to 8 mmHg. Try to walk at least 1,000 steps each day.

2. Avoid stress
Breathing exercises and meditation like yoga or tai chi are effective for lowering stress hormones. The high stress hormones will increase rennin, a kidney enzyme that can raise blood pressure. Perform breathing exercise at least 5 minutes in the morning and evening. Another way is relaxation. The study from the University of Florence, Italy, revealed that hypertension patients do relaxation by listening to music for 30 minutes followed by taking a deep breath showed a decrease in systolic scores to 3.2 points.

3. Consume food containing Potassium
According to Linda Van Horn, Ph.D., professor of disease prevention in Northwest University Feinberg School of Medical, lots of potassium like in fruits and vegetables are very good for lowering blood pressure. The best sources of potassium are potatoes, tomatoes, orange juice, bananas, beans, cantaloupe, honeydew, and dried fruit like raisins. Linda advices consumption of potassium is 2,000-4,000 mg per day.

4. Limit sodium
Salt intake should be no more than 2.4 grams per day (sodium) or 6 grams per day (NaCl). In order for salt intake is under control. See the food label to determine levels of sodium and less fast food because it usually contains a high salt.

5. Consume dark chocolate
Chocolate lovers would be pleased, because the content of flavonoids in chocolate can help lower blood pressure by stimulating the production of nitro oxide. Nitric oxide makes the signal to the muscles surrounding blood vessels to relax, and increase blood flow.