What can cause High Blood Pressure?

Blood pressure is the pressure of the blood in your blood vessels as it is pumped throughout your body by the heart. It continuously changes depending on the needs of your body and may alter depending on your body position, sleep, breathing or emotional state. Your blood pressure is a measurement taken of the highest pressure (systolic) as the heart beats and the lowest pressure (diastolic) as the heart relaxes before the next beat. If the higher figure (systolic) is higher than 140mmHg or the lower figure (diastolic) is higher than 90, or both, you are considered to have high blood pressure also known as hypertension. High blood pressure is one of the main risk factors for heart attacks or stroke (cardiovascular disease) and kidney disease. Often there are no symptoms for high blood pressure therefore, it is important to get your blood pressure checked regularly by a health professional.

What Causes High Blood Pressure?

Poor Eating Habits

Poor eating habits can lead to high blood pressure. A healthy, balanced diet is important to reduce your blood pressure. It is recommended that you enjoy a wide variety of nutritious foods, with a focus on fresh and unprocessed food. A diet that is rich in wholegrains, fibre, vitamins and minerals and healthy fats and naturally low in unhealthy fats, salt and added sugar is ideal. It is important to limit your salt intake by not adding salt to your food during cooking or at the dinner table.

Alcohol Intake

Drinking alcohol can increase your blood pressure, especially regular heavy drinking. Be mindful of the amount of alcohol in a standard drink and limit your alcohol intake by following the recommended healthy limits.

Family History

High blood pressure tends to run in families for many reasons. If your parents or other close blood relatives have high blood pressure, there is an increased chance that you will develop it too. A family or personal history of the following may also increase your risk of developing high blood pressure including diabetes, chronic kidney disease, early onset coronary heart disease, stroke, unhealthy levels of cholesterol and/or triglycerides and low birth weight. If you have a family history of high blood pressure, you should get your blood pressure checked at least once a year to make sure it is within the normal levels.

Physical Activity

Regular physical activity is great for your heart health. It helps your heart and blood vessels to stay strong and healthy which may help lower your blood pressure. It can also help to keep a healthy weight which may also help lower your blood pressure. Aim to get at least 30 minutes of exercise on most days of the week such as brisk walking, cycling, swimming or dancing. Find out which exercise suits you the best and starts slowly if you are not used to exercising. It is also important to reduce your sitting time by breaking up the time with stretching or going for a walk.

Smoking

The nicotine in cigarettes can temporarily raise your blood pressure and both smoking and exposure to second hand smoke can increase the risk of heart disease. Quitting smoking can help to lower blood pressure and improve your overall health.

Unhealthy Weight

Maintaining a healthy weight can reduce the risk of high blood pressure and other health problems. Exercising and maintaining a healthy, balanced diet will help you to lose weight. You can use some tools such as the Body Mass Index (BMI) and waist measurement to assess the recommended healthy weight for your body. Consider lifestyle changes if you are overweight or obese, including weight reduction, a healthy, balanced diet, reducing salt intake, increasing your physical activity and limiting your consumption of alcohol.

Why is Your Blood Pressure Important?

A healthy blood pressure is important for a normal blood flow, which enables your body to receive essential nutrients and oxygen to function. If your blood pressure is too high, it affects the blood flow to the organs and increases the chance of developing heart disease, stroke, kidney failure, diabetes and other health conditions over the years. Occasionally, people with very high blood pressure are at serious risk of problems and need urgent treatment in the hospital to reduce the risk of a stroke or heart attack. It is advisable that you should get your blood pressure checked by your doctor at least once a year (or more if advised).

How to Know if You Have High Blood Pressure

Checking your blood pressure regularly can help you to identify whether you have high blood pressure. Your doctor will tell you what your ideal blood pressure should be, depending on your medical history.

An “optimal” blood pressure reading would be:

Systolic blood pressure under 120mmHg
Diastolic blood pressure under 80mmHg

How to Treat High Blood Pressure

Eating better

Eating a varied diet of healthy foods can help to reduce your blood pressure. We need to eat plenty of vegetables, fruit and wholegrains as these foods contain a variety of vitamins and minerals as well as fibre and antioxidants. The simple way to change your diet is swapping the refined grains like white bread and white rice for wholegrain foods such as brown rice, wholemeal pasta, grainy bread and oats. Plus, we need a variety of healthy protein-rich foods such as beans, chickpeas, lentils, nuts and seeds as well as fish and seafood.

Fats and oils can play an important role in increasing the risk of heart disease. Unhealthy fats (saturated fats and trans fats) can increase your risk of developing heart disease while healthier fats (unsaturated fats) can help to protect your heart. We need to reduce salt intake as well by using herbs and spices to flavour food instead.

Exercise

Regular exercise is crucial for the health of your lungs, heart and blood vessels. It relaxes the blood vessels and heart which make them become flexible and efficient and also help to lower your blood pressure. Try to aim for at least 30 minutes of moderate-intensity exercise on most or all days of the week. If you are overweight, losing weight should help to lower your blood pressure and reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease. Maintaining a healthy weight is a very important way to keep your heart healthy and lower your blood pressure.

Reducing Alcohol Intake

Drinking too much alcohol can increase your blood pressure, therefore limiting alcohol intake can help to lower blood pressure. The recommended healthy limits for alcohol are:

No more than two standard drinks on any day for healthy men and women
No more than four standard drinks on a single occasion can help to reduce the risk of alcohol-related disease

Quit Smoking

Being smoke-free is the best thing you can do to protect your heart! Tobacco use can increase the risk of high blood pressure and can also damage the heart and blood vessels. Stopping smoking can reduce this risk and is especially important if you already have high blood pressure. If want to know more about how to quit smoking, talk to your Pharmacist or GP. There are several of treatments and strategies to help you to reduce cravings for cigarettes.

Medication

Occasionally, diet and exercise maybe not be enough to lower your blood pressure. Your doctor or specialist may prescribe medications to help lower your blood pressure and to help reduce risk of developing a heart attack or stroke. It is important to regularly review with your doctor or specialist any medications you are taking for high blood pressure to assess the ongoing benefits and risks. Speak to your pharmacist to help ensure you do not run out of your medication and to provide you with additional support and information to maximise the effects.

How Your Pharmacist Can Help

Maintaining healthy blood pressure is vital to ensuring both your heart and circulation continue working correctly.

Blood pressure naturally fluctuates, constantly adjusting to your heart’s needs. However, when your blood pressure is consistently higher than normal for a long period of time, this is called Hypertension and this can put you at risk of heart disease.

It is important to have your blood pressure levels checked by a professional regularly, particularly as you get older.

That is why we provide FREE blood pressure checks to our customers.

Visit your local Star Discount Chemist and speak to one of our Pharmacists to arrange your FREE blood pressure check-up or to find out more.

To seek further information to elaborate on this general advice, refer to your Pharmacist or GP.