PREVENTIVE MEASURES TO AVOID HYPERTENSION.

Hypertension is defined as the increase of blood pressure within the arteries; it is a silent disease that affects a billion people around the world, most of them being unaware that they suffer from it all according to the World Health Organisation (WHO). It is considered to one of the triggering risk factors for heart attacks and cerebrovascular accidents.

What makes it such a deadly disease is the lack of symptoms that it exhibits or the fact that symptoms are only exhibited in severe cases or in those with complications. The normal levels are 140/90 even though it would be ideal if they were 120/80.

PREVENTION MEASURES

These prevention measures are directed to modify risk factors that we have control over such as:

WEIGHT

According to the Waist/Height ratio, which consists in dividing the perimeter of the waist by height in centimetres, it is recommended to lose weight if the result is higher than 0.50.

DIET

A healthy diet should be rich in fruits and vegetables, legumes, whole grains, fish (rich in Omega 3), olive oil, etc.

Industrial goods containing high levels of sodium, sugars and trans fats should be avoided as much as possible. The intake of trans fats such as lard, cold meats, etc. should also be reduced.

EXERCISE

It is recommended that we should walk for a minimum of half an hour to an hour, five days a week in order to maintain normal blood pressure levels.

REDUCTION OF SALT INTAKE

The recommended salt intake is between 4 to 5 grams of salt per day.

Let us keep in mind that ready meals, cold meats, snacks, a number of drinks, etc. are saturated in salt, therefore we should keep an eye on the nutritional information that can be found in certain products.

TOBACCO AND ALCOHOL

Tobacco and alcohol are two important risk factors in order to monitor blood pressure and cardiovascular diseases.

HYPERCHOLESTEROLEMIA AND DIABETES

Both of these two risk factors are usually linked with hypertension so elevated levels of LDL Cholesterol or Bad Cholesterol and hyperglycaemia or Diabetes should always be monitored.

Lastly, it is important to state that we should monitor blood pressure from infancy onwards to ensure that we have a future without hypertension.

Dr J. Hurtado Martínez
Medical Director of HealthSalus