However, blood pressure-lowering medication may be necessary to help patients reduce the risk of a stroke, heart failure or kidney damage caused by hypertension. Making lifestyle changes – changes in your diet, such as eating a low carbohydrate diet, and exercising more – are ideally the best ways to reduce your blood pressure. A calculated difference between the systolic pressure, the first number (when the heart contracts) and the diastolic pressure (when the heart relaxes) can also be a sign of a problem. In many cases, if your blood pressure is more severely elevated, say over 160/100, medication is likely to be prescribed. An ideal healthy blood pressure is around 120/80, with a reading of 140/90 considered elevated. That’s why it’s important, especially if you’re older, to have your blood pressure checked on a regular basis, even if you feel generally healthy. Know your blood pressure numbers, and how you can best prevent high blood pressure from developing. If you ignore your blood pressure because you think symptoms will alert you to the problem, you’re taking a huge risk. In fact, in most cases, this is a silent disease. This, in turn, leads to the accumulation of fluid and salt in the body that increase body weight and result in high blood pressure.Ī common misconception is that those with high blood pressure experience such symptoms as nervousness, sweating, difficulty sleeping or facial flushing. Carbohydrates break down into simple sugars once they arrive in your stomach, which raises your blood sugar and results in the body producing more of the hormone insulin. That’s not the case today, primarily because of the Western diet, which tends to be heavy in high-glycemic carbohydrates. This is a condition that should not be ignored, as it can lead to an increased risk of heart disease, stroke and kidney damage.Īt one time, high blood pressure, or hypertension, was relatively rare. High blood pressure has become an all-too-common problem in America, affecting as many as one in three adults.