High Blood Pressure and Being Overweight
High blood pressure: Also called hypertension, high blood pressure is a condition in which the pressure exerted by blood as it is pumped through the arteries is consistently higher than normal. Normally, blood pressure at rest should not be greater than 120/80.
Blood pressure is considered high if it is repeatedly and persistently higher than 140/90.
High blood pressure can damage the arteries, heart, and other organs, including the kidneys and the eyes. It increases the risk of a heart attack, coronary artery disease, a stroke, kidney failure, and the loss of sight due to damage to the retina. Hypertension is more common in men than women, and the incidence increases with age.
Stroke is damage to the brain due to an interruption in the blood supply. It occurs either when there is bleeding in the brain or the flow of blood to the brain is blocked. Strokes can cripple or kill.
Hypertension and narrowed arteries due to diabetes, a high-fat diet, and high blood cholesterol contribute to the risk of a stroke. If that isn’t enough os a reason to get on a weight loss diet, here’s one more.
Being overweight is one of the most important risk factors for high blood pressure. People who are 20 per cent overweight are eight times more likely to have high blood pressure than people of normal weight.
For me, just these conditions are enough to convince me to get back to my weight loss tips and loss a few pounds.
When your blood pressure is taken, the compression band on your arm causes mercury to rise in a metered column. Two measurements are taken: the systolic reading is blood pressure at its highest, when the heart muscle contracts; the diastolic reading is blood pressure at its low point, when the heart muscle relaxes. In a blood pressure reading of 120/80, for example, the higher number (120) is systolic, the lower (80) is diastolic.
