Friday, January 30, 2009

Dangerous Blood Pressure Level Can Provoke Significant Cardiac Problems

Medical practitioners measure the blood pressure in millimeters of mercury. An elevated systolic blood pressure level is any number higher than 140. An elevated diastolic blood pressure level is any measurement more than 90. Those of us who test higher than these numbers over successive medical screenings are considered to have stage one hypertension. Stage 2 hypertension is a diastolic measure above 100 and a systolic blood pressure level of more than 160. People who have stage 2 hypertension are considered to be in a medical emergency. Find out more about dangerous blood pressure levels.

How Do We Recognize This And What Can We Do?

Dangerously high blood pressure level do not always have a known cause. Nor will an individual with high blood pressure levels necessarily notice any symptoms. Consequently, high blood pressure is often described as the "silent killer." In fact a person can have high blood pressure level for several years without even knowing it. The only way to establish whether or not you have high blood pressure is with regular medical screenings. It is not until a person develops stage 2 hypertension that they begin to notice that anything is wrong.

A person with highly elevated blood pressure levels may notice a strong headache, queasiness, debility, and blurred vision. If you notice any of these problems and you know, or think that you might have hypertension, go to your health care provider immediately.

The Vulnerability

If high blood pressure is left unchecked it can do severe damage to the heart, blood vessels, eyes, and kidneys. People with dangerously high blood pressure levels, who do not receive the needed treatment are at very high risk of eye damage, stroke, aneurysm, heart attack, heart failure, kidney failure, and even death. Therefore regular blood pressure screenings from a health care professional are critical.

What Are The Treatment Choices?

If two or more successive tests demonstrate that you have high blood pressure, then there is a great deal that you can do to help yourself. A healthy low-fat diet and regular exercise can help to lower your blood pressure. Even a moderate healthy weight loss can help reduce the problem of high blood pressure.

You should also eat less salt, cut down on alcohol consuption, and stop smoking if you partake in any of these habits. Many medications are also available to treat high blood pressure levels. Diuretics are helpful for people with stage one hypertension because they reduce the amount of sodium in the blood and decrease blood volume.

Your health care professional may also prescribe calcium channel blockers, which lower high blood pressure levels by reducing the regidity of the the muscles of the artery walls. Beta blockers are another option since they reduce the heart rate and decrease the strength of heart contractions to reduce some of the pressure. Then there are ACE inhibitors which inhibit a hormone called angiotensin, which is a chemical that makes the blood vessels tighten and can therefore exacerbate hypertension.

To learn about the full range of medicines available to treat dangerous levels of blood pressure, talk to your health care professional. Alternative programs are also available for natural control of blood pressure readings. There are exercises which reduce tension and stress. Acupuncture and meditation can also reduce your stress levels and bring down your blood pressure levels.

Wednesday, January 28, 2009

Obtaining Natural Control of Our High Blood Pressure Readings

If you have high blood pressure results (hypertension), you need to do some things to get your hypertension under control. If you are looking for natural control of your high blood pressure readings, you will need to make changes in several aspects of your life. This is referred to as a lifestyle change. With lifestyle alteration, you can get natural control of your high blood pressure.

These kinds of changes usually mean a modification in your diet, activity, relationships, and your stress level. For most of us in our modern culture, it is difficult to consider this massive a change in our lives. And, when you have a diagnosis of hypertension, the imminent threat of severe medical problems is so frightening that some of us are able to make these kinds of changes and we are able to maintain a deep resolve to changing our lifestyle.

Where Do These Changes Come From?

Hypertension is thought to be a modern cultural disorder. It is because we are living a modern lifestyle. Those who are living in more simple conditions do not have hypertension. They eat foods they grow themselves, they walk instead of riding in trains, their work is physical instead of sedentary. Their play is outside instead of watching TV or playing computer games. They use natural approaches instead of manufactured drugs when they are ill. They have natural control of their hypertension.

Those of us living in modern cultures may believe those more simple cultures as an inappropriate lifestyle for ourselves, but they are in better shape than ourselves. Maybe there is something that they are doing which is healthier than our modern cultural approach?

Modifying How We Eat

If you have hypertension and you want to control your hypertension, your doctors will tell you to eat more organic foods and fewer manufactured foods. They tell you to eat fresh fruits and vegetables. They tell you to eat less meat. This certainly sounds like what those who are living in more simple lifestyles are consuming.

Modifying Our Levels Of Activity

If you must control your high blood pressure levels, your medical practitioner will be telling you to perform physical exercise every day. This means walking or playing sports on an intense schedule. This would mean a more active approach to work and recreation than we are used to in our modern culture. This all actually sounds like the kinds of physical activities that those in less modern cultures are involved in every day.

Changing Relationships

If your relationships are currently maintained by phone, instant messaging, or emails, then you would need to alter how you relate so that your interactions are more intimate. This means you go to where those people are, or you work next to them so that your interactions become more direct and involve more activity instead of a sedentary approach.

Modifying Your Levels Of Stress

If you are always feeling under pressure, and you have high blood pressure, your physical and emotional lifestyle is an open request for heart attack or stroke. To live longer, you have to change your attitude, your expectations, and your emotions in order to reduce your level of stress. This means becoming more synchronized with the seasons of the year and more tuned into the cycles of the weather. It means becoming less bothered by the due dates of your projects at your job and more involved with nature.

Modifying The Way You Live

In order for you to make this lifestyle change, so you have a natural control of your own high blood pressure readings, you first have to develop a different set of cultural norms for yourself. You have to commit to walk instead of ride. You have to start buying or growing fresh foods and preparing them for yourself instead of buying prepared foods in the supermarket or in restaurants. You have to make sure you go outside and play. If you want to have a healthy lifestyle and healthy blood pressure levels, you need to commit to make these lifestyle changes for yourself. You can achieve natural control of your high blood pressure readings.