It seems that high blood pressure meds are simply not stopping hypertension, which one in three Americans have.
But the old stand by, the low-salt DASH diet rich in fruits, vegetables and low-fat foods has proven time and time again to work at lowering blood pressure – and doing much, much more for your health.
However, many people simply find it too difficult to adhere to DASH. Maybe it’s because the deck is really stacked against them, us, you, me. Processed foods and restaurant foods are loaded with salt. It’s time food manufacturers and restaurants stop messing up our health! CUT THE SALT!!!!
Information from the Mayo Clinic on DASH at the end. Also see my recipes which are packed with flavor, but not salt! Love, Elizabeth Fiend
Practical Blood Pressure Advice, Too Often Shelved for Convenience
Source: The New York Times
By ERIC SABO
It tastes bland and can be a tough daily regimen to follow, so it’s not the ideal medicine for high blood pressure. But a low-salt, heart-healthy diet is staging a comeback as some 60-plus drugs fail to rein in staggering rates of hypertension in the United States.
Even the Food and Drug Administration is weighing in, with recent deliberations on whether salt contents should be posted clearly on food labels. After years of acrimonious debate on the true dangers of sodium, anti-salt crusaders contend that the writing is on the wall. “The evidence is overwhelming,” said Dr. J. James Rohack, a Texas cardiologist who is working with the American Medical Association to rid the nation of its high-salt habits.
One plan of attack: calling on food companies and restaurants to cut the salt they serve by half over the next 10 years. The move could eventually end one of the major obstacles in fighting hypertension, the self-control and vigilance required when it comes to eating prepared or packaged foods. “People wouldn’t have to make a conscious decision,” said Dr. Lawrence J. Appel, a heart nutrition expert at Johns Hopkins University. “It could really make a difference.”
As many as half of the 70 million people in the United States with hypertension turn out to be sensitive to salt, versus 10 percent of Americans in general. Even so, only 22 percent of patients stick with a hypertension-taming, low-salt DASH diet rich in fruits, vegetables and low-fat dairy. That’s down from 30 percent in 1994. “We’re going in the wrong direction,” said Dr. Phillip Mellen of the Hattiesburg Health Clinic in Mississippi, who has studied nutritional aspects of high blood pressure.
Yet in knocking out one dietary demon, a much larger piece of the lifestyle puzzle still needs to be addressed. Rising rates of obesity, diets shockingly low in fruits and vegetables, and a lack of exercise are all major reasons one in three Americans now suffers from hypertension, experts say.
The sobering results come as pharmaceutical companies appear stalled in creating demonstrably superior new drugs to treat high blood pressure. Despite an expanding range of options, including Tekturna, the only novel hypertension treatment in nearly a decade, hypertension rates remain stubbornly high. For many patients, older, cheaper diuretics may work just as well as, or even better than, more heavily advertised treatments like calcium channel blockers or ACE inhibitors. And the most effective diuretic may be the first one made available, back in 1957.
Lacking a slam-dunk pill, the majority of patients end up relying on two or three drugs to keep their blood pressure under control. That state of affairs, some doctors say, could be better managed with the addition of diet and exercise. “We don’t have to worry about side effects from lifestyle changes,” said Dr. David C. Goff Jr., professor of epidemiology and public health at Wake Forest University School of Medicine in Winston-Salem, N.C. “But everyone finds it easier to prescribe drugs.”
The benefits of a proper diet are hardly a secret, even among those with traditionally less access to health care. One survey found that Latinos and African-Americans living in inner-city neighborhoods knew the dangers of eating poorly, but they also told researchers that restrictive diets are too hard to follow and insufficient to end the need for drugs. Years of bad eating may be impossible to undo. “Most people need to be on two drugs by the time we see them,” Dr. Appel said.
That’s a shame, because many patients might end at least some of their reliance on medications simply by eating better. The American Medical Association says that limiting sodium to 1,600 milligrams a day — about a teaspoon of salt — can prevent a five-point rise in systolic blood pressure. When combined with the right diet, cutting back on salt can lower blood pressure as well as any single hypertension pill, research shows. Adding protein and healthy monosaturated fats to the DASH diet may lead to even greater reductions in heart attack risk.
The joint national committee on high blood pressure, a government advisory panel, calls such dietary measures indispensable for treating hypertension, since they can lower blood pressure and improve the effectiveness of drugs. Lifestyle changes work best in combination, the group adds.
But until government regulations address the sodium slipped into processed and restaurant foods, experts say, many patients are going to find cutting back a tough battle to win. “Even when people are trying to be good, the deck is stacked against them,” Dr. Rohack said.
January, 2008
From the Mayo Clinic: Doing the DASH: Take the guesswork out of healthy eating
Increasing physical activity and maintaining a healthy weight are powerful tools in managing blood pressure, and so is following the Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension (DASH) eating plan.
The DASH diet combines the right kinds and combinations of foods and nutrients to lower your blood pressure and keep it under control.
The National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, part of the U.S. government’s National Institutes of Health, developed the DASH plan to reduce blood pressure, finding that blood pressure went down after only two weeks of being on the diet. Since the initial studies, researchers have found the DASH plan may offer other health benefits, too, such as protection against osteoporosis, cancer, heart disease and diabetes.
The DASH plan is especially effective in reducing blood pressure in blacks and older adults. In addition, if adopted early, the DASH plan can prevent hypertension.
The DASH plan: What to eat
The DASH eating plan is rich in grains, fruits, vegetables and low-fat dairy products. It also includes fish, poultry and legumes. Red meat, sweets and fats are included in smaller amounts. This variety means the DASH plan is low in saturated fat, cholesterol, total fat, and sodium while rich in protein, fiber and healthy nutrients, particularly magnesium, potassium and calcium.
The DASH plan now has two versions: the standard DASH plan and the lower sodium DASH plan. The low-sodium DASH plan encourages a further reduction in sodium consumption, which can help to reduce blood pressure even more than can the standard DASH plan.
The basic components of the DASH plan are not too different from the typical heart-healthy diet that most health organizations and doctors prescribe, such as the Therapeutic Lifestyle Changes (TLC) diet from the National Cholesterol Education Program or the Mayo Clinic Healthy Weight Pyramid. The DASH plan is different in its mix of nutrients due to its emphasis on such foods as fruits, vegetables and low-fat dairy products. These foods provide potassium, calcium and magnesium, which together have a potent effect on blood pressure. Also, some research suggests that substituting some carbohydrates with protein, mostly from plant sources, further lowers blood pressure.
Nutrient mix
Reducing sodium and increasing potassium, calcium and magnesium has a particularly potent effect on blood pressure. This mix of nutrients acts as a diuretic, helping the body excrete salt.
More at: Mayo Clinic
Categories: Blood pressure, high blood pressure, salt, sodium, medicine, alternative medicine, DASH Diet, heart disease
