High Blood Pressure: Natural Self-help for Hypertension, including 60 recipes. Michelle Berriedale-Johnson

       Introduction

      Whether or not you develop high blood pressure (hypertension) is influenced by several factors. These are your genes, the way you eat, and other aspects of your lifestyle such as the amount of exercise you take, whether or not you smoke, and the amount of alcohol you drink. Eating to beat high blood pressure is not only possible, it is one of the mainstays of effective treatment. This book looks at how various dietary changes can help to reduce a raised blood pressure and lessen your risk of developing associated complications such as coronary heart disease and stroke.

      Making simple, healthy changes to your lifestyle can also significantly reduce your chances of contracting coronary heart disease. For instance, if you stop smoking, your risk of getting heart disease drops by 50–70 per cent within five years. If you take up regular exercise, your risk falls by 45 per cent. Keeping your alcohol intake within healthy limits will also have a beneficial effect. Drinking two or three units a day can reduce your chances of heart disease by as much as 25–45 per cent, but excessive intakes increase the risk. Losing excess body weight will bring your chances of heart disease down by 35–55 per cent. For more on lifestyle changes, see Chapters 20 and 21.

      Food supplements are also effective in helping to maintain a healthy circulation. For more about these, please see Chapter 19.

      The delicious recipes provided by Michelle Berriedale-Johnson will make eating to beat hypertension as pleasant and easy as possible.