Ever highest number of Americans is being treated for hypertension, say researchers from the U.S. National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute.

The key factor in the striking increase in the number, appears to be the obesity prevalence in the U.S, they noted.

“Additional efforts are needed to prevent hypertension from developing in the first place, with primary emphasis on prevention of obesity. For those who have hypertension, additional efforts are needed to diagnose, treat and effectively control hypertension to reduce the adverse outcomes associated with hypertension.” said lead researcher Paul Sorlie.

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According to experts, men and women of certain age can prevent heart attack by taking aspirin daily.

Researchers from Nottingham and Sheffield universities analyzed data on more than 12,000 patients and they found aspirin proved beneficial for men aged 48 and above and women aged 57 and above.

Usually, blood vessel blockage because of some clot causes heart attacks and aspirin helps to avoid the formation of these blood clots. …Click here to read more

The Diet that government suggests for decreasing blood pressure can protect people from heart attack and strokes these are the findings of a large study that gives a fair evidence of it.

Researchers followed more than 88,000 healthy women for almost 25 years. They checked their food preferences and noted how many suffered heart attacks and strokes. Women who had similar eating habits as suggested by the government to prevent high blood pressure were quite protected from the heart disease.

This plan was named as DASH diet and it prefers vegetables, whole grains, low-fat milk and plant-based protein over meat. Women with those eating habits were 24% less apparent to suffer a heart attack and 18 % less apparent to have a stroke than women with usual American diets.

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According to a pilot study, Intravenous treatment to greatly lower the blood pressure of people who’ve just undergone hemorrhage in the brain may improve their prognosis.

Bleeding in skull often causes a quick climb in blood pressure, which may give further bleeding and the growth of the hematoma (a region of inner bleeding). The background information in the study suggests that it can cause the patient’s condition to get worse and enhance the risk of disability or loss of life.

To lower very high blood pressure as soon as possible in patients, with intracranial hemorrhage, is recommended but there is little support on when to start treatment or how much to lower blood pressure. This takes to wide dissimilarity in managing of high blood pressure in these patients.
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Grapefruit juice could be a potential source of risky interactions if it is mixed with certain specific medications. Johns Hopkins Health Alerts has recently attempted for finding the reasons of such effects.According to this review, there are some medications which do not mix well with some specific foods. The grapefruits or the grapefruit juice is one of these. It may interact with adverse impacts if mixed with certain medications. Natural grapefruits normally contain substances which can cause activity of enzymes in the intestines and liver where the medications are processed. Such type of mix would in turn result in to risky increase of the drug level in blood.

Another risky interaction may also occur between the blood thinner ‘warfarin’ and ‘vitamin K’. This vitamin is present in several types of multi-vitamins and other supplements along with other sources. Medical effects of the ‘warfarin’ gets neutralized because of its mixing with vitamin K. it also causes high risk of blood clotting which is the main effect of ‘warfarin’.

Scientists have now been successful in identifying specific responsible chemical present in the grapefruit juice which is mainly causing the interaction on mixing. A recent research study showing such evidences has also been published in the “American Journal of Clinical Nutrition”.

“Furanocoumarins (FCs)” are the main responsible chemical compounds for such interaction, according to the scientists. It is actually a family of chemical compounds which when mixed with the grapefruit juice causes such interactive effects in human body. Scientists, in order to confirm their doubt, created grapefruit juice which was free from these FCs. This juice was then compared with the effects of the normal grapefruit juice with normal FCs.

Scientists analyzed the results of this study which involved volunteers who drank 8oz of whole grapefruit juice in addition to the administered dose of ‘felodipine’, a typical blood pressure medication. The blood concentration of felodipine was observed to be three fold higher in case of those who took 8oz of normal juice in comparison to those who took the FCs free grapefruit juice.

Scientists could conclude that the blood pressure was higher with normal juice intake and this could be a risk with low blood pressure. Researchers also feel that the findings would be further helpful in developing better understanding of drug-food interactions. Scientists further suggested that one should always follow the medication guidelines strictly preventing any chance of such drug-food interactions which could be fatal.

Meals Matter Website Offers “Stress-Free Ways to Add Dairy Daily High Blood Pressure (hbp)” or “hypertension” means high pressure (tension) in the arteries and it is often known as silent killer as it might not have serious consequences in the beginning however it is associated with an increased risk of death and disability from heart disease, stroke, congestive heart failure, and end-stage renal disease. It affects one in three adults.

Andrea Garen, M.A., R.D., project manager at ‘Dairy Council of California’ has good news for the patients suffering from high blood pressure, informs, ” Making small, simple changes over time, such as eating low-fat yogurt for breakfast or drinking milk with meals, can increase calcium and vitamin D intake in a sustainable way.”

 A new study has proven that including low fat dairy products can reduce the risk of high blood pressure to a great extent. This has been recently discovered in one of the researches. Researchers at the ‘Brigham and Women’s Hospital’ in Boston when observed few women patients above the age of 45 found that the regular consumption of three or more daily servings of low-fat dairy products has been reducing the blood pressure. They were found 11 percent less likely to produce high blood pressure.

 The researchers had been giving the credit to the presence of calcium and vitamin D in these dairy products. The evidence was further strengthened by the fact as this defensive mechanism was found absent among other dietary supplements. This study results appeared in the February 7, 2008, special edition of the journal “Hypertension”.   

 The benefits from this study could be better utilized by using the website Meals Matter.  Meals Matter is a free, online family nutrition and meal-planning website.

Andrea Garen suggests that there is an interactive Calcium Quiz available on this site. This would help the patients to evaluate the current calcium intake. They can further search the database for recipes which would be rich in calcium and these could be easily added to the diet to add low-fat dairy foods every day. This site also has searchable databases to find diets rich in fruits, vegetables, whole grains and lean meats, regular dairy consumption can reduce the risk of osteoporosis, prevent certain cancers and help maintain a healthy weight.