High Blood Pressure Treatment - Medication, Diet and Alternative Therapies

Healthy lifestyle is the best treatment for high blood pressure

No drug can ever help you to win a battle against high blood pressure for good. The best they can do is to give a temporarily relief. However, by changing your lifestyle habits you can keep your blood pressure under control.

There are 3 major aspects of your life that affect blood pressure

• Exercise
• Diet
• Stress management

Making your heart beating slightly faster than normal from time to time is very important. This doesn’t mean you will have to go the gym every day. Many everyday things count as exercise - house chores, gardening, walking your dog or playing active games with your children are good examples. Walking is the best exercise for high blood pressure, even 15 minutes a day will do wonder.

Most important you should do some exercise every day.

Another essential thing you will have to evaluate is your diet. Do you like souses, pickles and pre-cooked meals? Than you will have to cut it down, because all of the above are extremely high in sodium and sodium affects blood pressure very badly. Add more veggies and fruits to your diet, remove your salt shaker from the table and you will feel much better as your blood pressure lowers.

Every time you stress out, your blood pressure jumps up. And if stress is a permanent part of your life it can constantly keep your readings high. Don’t ignore stress; there are many effective ways to deal with it. For example, you can enroll in a stress relief class or take a yoga or Tai Chi class. Try to find time to do things that you enjoy.

High blood pressure medication

When it comes to high blood pressure drugs, you should never get one without consulting a doctor. If a particular medicine works well for your friend it doesn’t mean it will suit you. Most high blood pressure drugs are prescription drugs, so the only way to get them is to visit your physician first and ask for prescription.

Medication used to control high blood pressure includes:

• ACE inhibitors
• Calcium channel blockers
• Beta-blockers
• Angiotensin-receptor blockers (ARBs)
• Alpha-blockers
• Diuretics

In the past a lot of high blood pressure medications were unsafe and had side effects. Luckily they improved in recent years, so modern drugs that help to lower your blood pressure are more effective and safe.

Alternative high blood pressure treatments

If you don’t trust conventional drugs and prefer alternative medicine, there are several treatments that can help to lower blood pressure.

Natural herbs for high blood pressure are very popular. Most effective are Hawthorn and Ginkgo Biloba. Several studies have shown that garlic also helps with hypertension control. Garlic thins the blood (reduces its ability to clot).

Garlic supplements work just as well as fresh garlic.

Among the alternative therapies, most common are acupuncture and magnetic high blood pressure therapy.

Acupuncture relaxes your body and releases some of the strain on the heart. There is no hard scientific proof that acupunctures works, but many people who tried it, swear that it helped to decrease their blood pressure.

Treatment with magnets can also help. Copper and iron bracelets reduce the effects of blood pressure, but scientists don’t know how and why. However, this treatment is painless and safe, so it is worth the try.

There are many ways to treat high blood pressure. You should never ignore it, because this condition doesn’t just go away unless you do something to control it.

Home Gym Tips - How To Build An Inexpensive Home Gym

Times are tough. Fortunately, exercise can be performed nearly anywhere. Many people are opting to work out at home, whether for convenience or due to the cost of gym memberships. If this appeals to you, before you race to the store and buy a trunkload of equipment, bars, and weight plates, I urge you to ask yourself why you want a home gym and answer honestly. Or better yet, if you invest the money, will you really use it? You don't want a $100 laundry hanger or $1000 dust collector, do you?

Once you commit to using your new gym, the next steps are to determine what room you will set it up in and how much space you realistically have. Look around the room. Many people with good intentions tell themselves that each time they use their gym, they won't mind moving the couch, the table and chairs, or the desk, but after a while, they start using this as an excuse not to exercise. Will having to slide a couch 4' out of the way be a deterrent? Is there is a television in the room? If so, do you have the self-discipline to not watch Oprah, Judge Judy, or a soap opera instead of working out? Can you control the temperature in this space? If not, can you add a fan? Once you start a, you will probably need it. Who else uses the room? Will there be conflicts? Will someone move your equipment or think it is a toy for them to play with? Don't be intimidated by these questions. Working through them shouldn't be that difficult or time-consuming, especially if you let your family or roommates know what you are doing.

Now the excitement begins because it's time to get started! A simple and inexpensive home gym can be built with five pieces of equipment. They total about $100 and are easy to find and transport home. You can buy them from local exercise stores, online, or perhaps used on your community's Craig's List. Following each is a few of their possible uses.

1. Exercise Ball abdominal and core stabilization, upper body exercises)
   
   
2. Resistance Bands (one full set of resistance bands can give you a total body workout)
   
   
3. Yoga Mat (push ups, abdominal/core work, stretching, pilates, and of course yoga)
   
   
4. Pull-Up Bar - some can be installed in doorways or follow the traditional installation method (back and limited bicep work, abdominal/core work), and
   
   
5. Jump Rope - if you have ceiling clearance (warm up, cardiovascular work).

Also, use what you may already have available in your home:

• Move a chair without wheels or arms into the area (decline push ups, tricep dips)
  
• Run the stairs (cardiovascular, leg work)
  
• Stairs (standing calf raises)
  
• Wall mirror to check your form
  
• Radio or headphones to play your favorite music, and
  
• Television or monitor with DVD player for taped routines

If you aren't sure how to start, meet with a personal trainer for a couple of sessions. It will be money well-invested because you will be given a program based on your family history, exercise history, and your goals, you will understand how to properly use your equipment, and you will have learned proper form and technique which reduces the chance of injury.

And as with all exercise, you should wear appropriate shoes and comfortable clothes. Bring a bottle of water and a towel, and get to it!

Quick Exercises For The Home Or Office

These workouts can be done at home or even in your office. With this workout plan, you can work out for just a couple minutes at a time, several times throughout each day, 5 days/week.

This consists of only bodyweight exercises done for about 2-3 minutes, 6-8 times per day, throughout each day. Now obviously if you work a normal office job, you are going to have to not be shy about doing a few exercises in your office and having your cube-mates watch you. Actually, even some people that have tried this have actually gotten their co-workers to join them.

If you work from home, or are a stay at home mom, there's no reason you can't fit these in throughout the day while at home. If you end up having a busy day with meetings and so forth, and can only fit a couple of these 2-minute workouts in, then so be it, but try to get as many done each day as you can.
If you're on a normal 9-5 office schedule, I recommend doing your 2-minute workouts every hour, on the hour, with the exception of lunch. Try doing these at 9am, 10am, 11am, 1pm, 2pm, 3pm, and 4pm.

Some of the bodyweight exercises that are the best to focus on are:

* bodyweight squats (and variations)
* pushups (and variations)
* forward, reverse, or walking lunges
* up & down a staircase if one is available
* floor planks (holding the plank position from forearms and feet)
* floor abs exercises such as lying leg thrusts, ab bicycles, etc.
* one-legged bodyweight Romanian deadlifts

This list is not fully comprehensive, but I wanted to keep it relatively simple. If you know other good bodyweight exercises, you can add those to your routine also. If you want to keep it real simple and don't want to get down on the floor for anything, you can stick to squats, lunges, and pushups and still get great results.

Flat Belly Diet

Flat Belly Diet targets the millions of Americans who want to take a few inches off of their waistline. The writers, Liz Vaccariello and Cynthia Sass, both work for Prevention magazine; with Vaccariello (editor-in-chief) being the primary voice of the book and Sass (nutrition director) providing additional knowledge and insight.
In essence, the book promises a flatter belly and weight loss of up to 15 pounds in 32 days by following the diet plan. The diet itself is fashioned after the traditional diet of the Mediterranean – more specifically, the southern regions. It allows for 1600 calories per day, with an emphasis on wholesome, unrefined foods; including nuts, fruits, vegetables, whole grains, beans, seeds, and lean protein. Red meat is restricted – only being allowed about once a month.
Before beginning the diet, dieters go on a four-day, anti-bloat, jump-start diet. The idea is to get dieters in the mindset for healthier eating while making them feel better by relieving bloating, constipation, and the general sluggishness that usually accompanies unhealthy eating. After the four-day period, dieters then start the 28-day program, with a focus on having a monounsaturated fat (MUFA) at every meal. This, according to the authors, is the secret to the Flat Belly Diet and what makes it different and more-successful. Exercise is optional, but encouraged.
All in all, Flat Belly Diet provides a fairly normal approach to dieting, with the addition of increased good fats (MUFA). There is no calorie-counting, which is a boon for many dieters. Instead, dieters choose from a list of 28 mix-and-match meal and snack plans. The book also includes 80 recipes, complete with nutritional analysis for each one. The drawbacks of Flat Belly Diet include 1) difficulty maintaining the weight loss rate after the initial 32 days, and 2) 1600 calories is too low for most people, which could result in binge eating and the yo-yo dieting effect.
If you decide to try Flat Belly Diet, we would recommend adjusting the calorie intake to meet or exceed your BMR and adding a fitness regime to start building muscle mass. Diet alone may help you lose weight, but exercise is essential for maintaining a healthy lifestyle.

How to Burn

Put quite simply, to burn fat, you must expend more calories than you ingest. Certainly, this rule can prove hard to conform to. However, with a little perseverance and discipline, the pounds will come off.
Before you eat, ask yourself if you really feel hungry or if you want to eat because you feel bored. If you are hungry, eat, but only until you feel full! Steer clear of greasy fast food, t.v. dinners, and junk food. Peruse your local farmer’s market and stock up on goodies like fresh tomatoes, lettuce, and beets. Eat these natural foods and stop eating when you feel comfortable, not Thanksgiving-level full. You’re probably thinking “how to burn fat in addition to eating right?” Of course, eating well plays an integral part in weight loss, but one should also exercise.
I have experienced the best results when I run first thing in the morning before I have eaten anything. These morning runs eliminate the need for coffee—which saves calories and money—and I noticed myself getting toned faster than when I did afternoon workouts. Run for twenty to thirty minutes and change up your course so you do not get bored. After running, do ab workouts and lifting. After a month, you may want to change the order of these activities to preserve your interest.
Just remember, if you really want to burn fat, do not lose focus. Keep carrots or celery with you at all times to fight snack attacks at the office. Stay motivated in any way you can—I do this by reading superficial magazines such as “Shape” and “Glamour.” Go with some of the old tricks; weigh yourself every week to monitor your progress and put a mirror up on the fridge. Celebrate your weight loss victories by rewarding yourself with, say, that expensive garment you have always wanted. Most importantly, be realistic. Do not expect to lose more than a pound or two per week.

Does walking really work?

A team from the University of Alberta compared more traditional moderate intensity fitness regimes with the often recommended 10,000 step a day walking plan and found that the improvements in fitness achieved by the exercisers were markedly higher than those of the walkers.Dr Vicki Harber, who led the study, said that the results had shown that gentle exercise was not enough to get people fit, and voiced her concern that too much emphasis was being placed on encouraging people to do walk and take any form of gentle exercise, when in fact this in itself is of little real value; ‘Generally, low-intensity activity such as walking alone is not likely to give anybody marked health benefits compared to programmes that occasionally elevate the intensity’ she said.The researchers studied 128 sedentary people, dividing them into two groups of walkers and exercisers. The walkers undertook their 10,000 step regime for six months as did the group that was given the more intense exercise program. Both groups burned off the same amount of energy.The researchers measured blood pressure and lung capacity in both groups and found that the walking program increased oxygen intake by an average four per cent, while the exercise group achieved a ten per cent increase.Harber did not dismiss the benefits of walking out of hand though, saying that the 10,000 step program was a good introduction to exercise, and advocated gradually introducing more vigorous activity into those steps; ‘Across your day, while you are achieving those 10,000 steps, take 200 to 400 of them at a brisker pace’ she said.Professor Stuart Biddle, an expert in exercise science at the University of Loughborough, concurred with Harber that current guidelines for exercise may not go far enough. But he also warned that increasing the recommendations to include more vigorous activity could be something of a shot in the foot as it could well deter the more sedentary among the population from exercising altogether, whereas the walking guidelines at least seemed achievable; ‘you have got to strike a compromise between physiology and psychology. The harder you make it, the fewer people will actually do it’ he said.

Yoga Can Ease Back Pain

If you are practicing yoga, you may not know what you are missing in terms of back pain, stress and anxiety. However thousands of Americans suffer from back pain every day. If you happen to know one of them, consider passing along a bit of new information that might help them: A new back pain study sponsored by the National Institutes of Health showed better results with yoga than conventional therapeutic exercise or information alone."The study suggests that for people who are looking to do something for themselves, you could clearly say that yoga is the best," says Karen Sherman, an epidemiologist and researcher with Group Health Cooperative in Seattle, and the lead author of the study.The study compared 101 adults with chronic lower back pain. One group tried conventional therapeutic exercise taught by a physical therapist. Another took weekly classes in viniyoga, a yoga style focusing on safety and therapeutic benefits. The third group studied a popular back pain book, “The Back Pain Helpbook.”At the end of the 12 week study, the yoga group showed far more increased function than the other two groups in tasks like walking up stairs without pain or bending over to tie their shoelaces. The yoga group and needed less pain medications as well. Your yoga practice could be saving you trips to the doctor and the pharmacy even now.Viniyoga is an ancient Sanskrit term that implies differentiation, adaptation, and appropriate application. This highly personalized style adapts the various means and methods of practice to the unique condition, needs and interests of the individual, according to the American Viniyoga Institute. This approach evolved out of the teachings transmitted by T. Krishnamacharya and T.K.V. Desikachar of Madras, India, and incorporate many dimensions of teaching and practice, including asana, pranayama, bandha, sound, chanting, meditation, personal ritual and textual study.Breathing was mentioned as an important aspect of yoga by the study’s lead author. Since yoga breathing practices make people conscious of their body’s movement, it can also make them aware of unnatural movement patters which can contribute to their back problems. Be sure not to overlook this aspect of your yoga practice.The study also highlights the importance of a good yoga instructor and a studio environment for best results. So if you’ve been using mainly DVDs and booklets, now might be the time to consider joining a studio. The group reading the Back Pain Helpbook actually increased their medication usage.Kate Lorig, one of the co-authors of "The Back Pain Helpbook" and the director of the Stanford Patient Education Research Center, underscored the need for proper instruction rather relying on written directions."We have long known that in most cases giving people information alone is not enough to change either health behaviors or health status," she says. "I would never expect a book alone to make much difference."

Kundali Yoga to fight stress

It is true that positive stressors can be good for us and good for our nervous system. It is only when the stress is too extreme, too prolonged, inappropriate to the challenge or accompanied by strong negative emotions like fear that the stress load gets unmanageable.
In Sanskrit the word kundalini means life force. Literally translated the word kundalini actually means "that which is coiled." Many yoga practitioners refer to the kundalini as a serpent. The serpent in the body is also known as the person's life force.
Kundalini is a type of yoga that focuses on communication between mind and body. People who practice kundalini believe that such communication is important for physical and mental health. They also believe that this yoga will promote psychospiritual growth. That is why people who practice kundalini are masters of concentration. Concentration is essential for communication. It is the first step for connecting the physical and spiritual self.

On the other hand, stress in the body comes from emotional stress or physical stress that we put on the body through our activity, our environment (toxins) or the food we eat. The stress response shifts all the resources away from repair and maintenance. We stop repairing muscle, managing our blood sugar levels and relaxing our heart and vessels. This may explain why rest alone is not the cure for all stress. We need a deeper “relaxation response” that re-engages the innate maintenance mechanism of the body’s innate intelligence. When we are chronically stressed we don’t go back to zero. The body stays on high alert and we start to literally break down- drowning in our own cortisol soup. If we can regularly get to that inner zero point, we give ourselves the chance to heal. That is why lifestyle, meditation and exercise are very effective treatments for this

Why is Exercise Important?

Have you ever heard the expression "use it or lose it"? It's true! If you don't use your body, you will surely lose it. Your muscles will become flabby and weak. Your heart and lungs won't function efficiently. And your joints will be stiff and easily injured. Inactivity is as much of a health risk as smoking!
Helps Prevent Diseases Our bodies were meant to move -- they actually crave exercise. Regular exercise is necessary for physical fitness and good health. It reduces the risk of heart disease, cancer, high blood pressure, diabetes and other diseases. It can improve your appearance and delay the aging process.
Improves Stamina When you exercise, your body uses energy to keep going. Aerobic exercise involves continuous and rhythmic physical motion, such as walking and bicycling. It improves your stamina by training your body to become more efficient and use less energy for the same amount of work. As your conditioning level improves, your heart rate and breathing rate return to resting levels much sooner from strenuous activity.
Strengthens and Tones Exercising with weights and other forms of resistance training develops your muscles, bones and ligaments for increased strength and endurance. Your posture can be improved, and your muscles become more firm and toned. You not only feel better, but you look better, too!
Enhances Flexibility Stretching exercises are also important for good posture. They keep your body limber so that you can bend, reach and twist. Improving your flexibility through exercise reduces the chance of injury and improves balance and coordination. If you have stiff, tense areas, such as the upper back or neck, performing specific stretches can help "loosen" those muscles, helping you feel more relaxed.
Controls Weight Exercise is also a key to weight control because it burns calories. If you burn off more calories than you take in, you lose weight. It's as simple as that.
Improves Quality of Life Once you begin to exercise regularly, you will discover many more reasons why exercise is so important to improving the quality of your life. Exercise reduces stress, lifts moods, and helps you sleep better. It can keep you looking and feeling younger throughout your entire life.
How Often Should I Exercise?
The benefits of any exercise program will diminish if it's disrupted too frequently. A "stop-start" routine is not only ineffective, but can cause injuries. Being consistent with exercise, therefore, is probably the most important factor in achieving desired results.
People often assume that more is better. Wrong! Doing too much too soon or performing intense exercises on a daily basis will have deleterious effects, such as muscle/tendon strains, loss of lean tissue, and fitness-level plateaus.
If you are a beginner, start off slower than you think you should. Three days per week is realistic, safe and effective. If you are experienced, do cardiovascular (aerobic) exercises such as walking, jogging and bicycling for no more than 200 minutes per week with no more than 60 minutes per session.
Weight training should be done no more than three times per week targeting the same muscle groups. Exercise the same muscle groups on non-consecutive days because muscles need adequate time to recover and cannot be effectively trained if they are tired or sore.
Many people forget to stretch or make the excuse that they don't have the time. Flexibility is important, so make the time! Stretching can be done every day, but stick to a minimum of three times per week in order to reap the benefits. When the body is warmed up, such as after a workout session, perform five to 10 stretches that target the major muscle groups. Hold each stretch for 10-30 seconds.