Health Articles And Advice

The medical term for high blood pressure is ‘hypertension’. As a general rule, you’re considered to be ‘hypertensive’ if your blood pressure is consistently above the ideal 120/80. Some people are genetically predisposed for having high blood pressure, but there are other factors that often contribute to it, regardless of your genes.

To make you better understand high blood pressure or hypertension, you should know what hypertension really is. When your blood pressure is taken, what is actually measured is the amount of pressure your blood is exerting against the walls of your blood vessels. When you get a higher number, it means that more pressure is being forced against those walls.

Think of a balloon as it is being filled with water. You will see that the balloon stretches as more and more water is being put into it. As you continue to fill the balloon, you can see that the balloon is thinning out, and eventually stretch itself to the breaking point.

The same fate will happen to your blood vessels if your blood pressure gets too high and remains high. They can and will burst. The severity of the results is determined by the location of the burst vessel. If it is located in the brain, you can have a stroke. If it is a vessel that transports blood to your heart, you can have a heart attack or suffer a complete heart failure.

This is why high blood pressure is often called the ’silent killer’. You may feel fine and have no symptoms whatsoever…until the pressure becomes so great that it causes a life-threatening episode.

The numbers of your blood pressure reading are called systolic and diastolic pressure. The systolic pressure is the top number and indicates how much pressure is within the blood vessels every time your heart beats or pumps blood out. The diastolic pressure is the bottom number and indicates how much pressure exists within the blood vessels in between beats, or when your heart is at rest.

This is the reason why doctors are more critical of the bottom number. If your diastolic pressure is over 80, and especially once it gets over 90, it means that a great amount of pressure is being exerted on your vessels even though your heart is not working, or is at rest. With high blood pressure, the spurting force of the blood as it leaves the heart the next time could be the one that proves to be too much.

So how do you lower your blood pressure? If you are overweight, lose those excess pounds. If your are overly stressed, avoid and eliminate the causes of stress. If you are smoking, stop. And if you are sedentary, exercise more.

Or you can do something easier, but is quicker and just as effective. You can avail of my Hypertension Program, which I designed to lower your chances of heart attack or stroke by lowering your blood pressure to acceptable levels. What’s more, it does not involve drastic lifestyle changes or hours of sweating in a gym.

It’s a series of easy, simple exercises which only take a few minutes a day and which you can do with little effort. The impact it will have on your blood pressure numbers is nothing short of life-saving.