World Hypertension Day: Five steps for reversing high blood pressure.

High blood pressure or hypertension is one of the most common lifestyle diseases today worldwide. According to research presented in 2018 at the 70th Annual Conference of the Cardiological Society of India (CSI), one in five young adults in India has high blood pressure; that equates to around 80 million people. However, if you look at the data from 50-60 years ago, people suffering from high blood pressure in India were negligible. So, what led to the surge?

There are four major issues now that need to be resolved:

1. The fact that the younger population in India is being diagnosed with high BP is very alarming and the main cause for this is erratic lifestyle, stress and poor eating habits.
2. Majority of the population with high blood pressure simply pops a pill to control it instead of making lifestyle changes to treat the root cause and completely reverse it.
3. If we do not make lifestyle changes and are just dependent on pills, then we are at high risk of heart problems, atrial fibrillation, stroke, chronic kidney disease and cognitive decline — these complications arise with prolonged High BP.
4. Many people with hypertension believe that it is a lifelong disease. However, the fact is it is a lifestyle disease and not a lifelong disease. Hence, proper lifestyle changes to reverse it is the need of the hour.

High blood pressure can be prevented and reversed with the help of right lifestyle changes, with a focus on inculcating plant-based diet. Following are five strategies that can help you reverse high blood pressure. But, before getting into the details of these strategies, there is a need to change mindset — we will not live with high BP, instead we will reverse it.

Strategy 1

Increased intake of plant foods: If we consume a plant-based nutrition dense diet that is high in fibre and micronutrients, your blood pressure will reduce to a great extent. A diet rich in potassium, magnesium, omega -3 fatty acids and nitrates is very crucial for the reversal of high blood pressure. Hence, foods like drumsticks, flax seeds, papaya, pomegranate, zucchini and many others are excellent for high BP.

Strategy 2

Start walking and stop smoking: Researchers have shown that walking can dilate your arteries and make them flexible. And more the arteries dilate, the more nitric oxide they produce, which is required for reversing high BP. Equally important is avoiding smoking, which damages blood vessel in our body.

Strategy 3

Meditation and pranayam: It has been scientifically proven that practicing yoga, meditation, pranayam can prove to be beneficial in numerous ways — they relax the nervous system, ease tension and improve blood circulation.

Strategy 4

Lemon water: Mix fresh lemon juice with plain water and drink it throughout the day. Lemon water is highly alkaline and drinking it can be an easy way to improve blood pressure.

Strategy 5

Superfoods: Although eating a plant-based food will definitely reverse lifestyle diseases and high BP in particular, we should make note of these five superfoods that are excellent for reversing hypertension:

• Flax seeds powder.
• Ash gourd juice.
• Drumsticks.
• Beetroot.
• Spinach.

The first step towards reversing hypertension is awareness and knowledge. Once we have understood what is right, all we need to do is apply the acquired information to make lifestyle changes.