As regular readers know, I am a giant fan of walking. I have called it the Cinderella of the exercise world because it is so unappreciated.
If this isn’t enough, please check out my Page – Why you should walk more.
Tony
Tag Archives: blood pressure
Have a healthy heart – Infographic
As you can see, majority of the risk factors that can hurt your heart health can be prevented – the answer lies in your hands.
These are risk factors along with the preventive options:
- High blood cholesterol – Eat right by having a balanced and healthy diet. Your fasting blood glucose should preferably be less than 100 mg/dL.
- High blood pressure – Manage blood pressure through exercise and medications. Keep the numbers below 120/80 mm Hg.
- Physical inactivity – Get moving and stand more. Spend 150 minutes of moderate intensive activity per week, like brisk walking. And opt for 75 minutes of vigorous-intensity activity. Eat less; move more; live longer. A sedentary lifestyle is a killer. Check out my Page – Do you know the dangers of too much sitting?
- Obesity and overweight – Lose weight to find your healthy weight. Target a Body Mass Index (BMI) of less than 25. Check out my Page – How dangerous is a big belly?
- Smoking – Stop smoking altogether, quit it. Your alcohol intake should be within limits too. Check out my Page – How many ways does smoking harm you?
- Diabetes – Reduce blood sugar by being conscious and careful of your food and beverages intake.
You will be surprised to know that lowering the risk of heart disease also reduces the chances of getting cancer!
One good thing that comes out of this infographic is that about 27% people live a heart-healthy lifestyle.
All this information would help only if you take some positive steps towards taking care of your heart.
Study finds 500 more genes that affect blood pressure
Blood pressure is the force of the blood pushed against the the wall of the arteries …
Over 500 new gene regions that influence people’s blood pressure have been discovered in the largest global genetic study of blood pressure to date, led by Queen Mary University of London and Imperial College London.
Photo by rawpixel.com on Pexels.com
Involving more than one million participants, the results more than triple the number of blood pressure gene regions to over 1,000 and means that almost a third of the estimated heritability for blood pressure is now explained.
High blood pressure is a major risk factor for stroke and heart disease and was responsible for an estimated 7.8 million deaths worldwide in 2015. While lifestyle risk factors are relatively well-known and include obesity, smoking, alcohol and high salt-intake, high blood pressure is also highly heritable through genetics. Prior to this study however, the genetic architecture of blood pressure had not been well understood. Continue reading
It’s official – spending time outside is good for you – Study
One of my favorite songs as a kid in the 1940’s was “Don’t fence me in.”
Here are some of the lyrics:
Oh, give me land, lots of land under starry skies above
Don’t fence me in
Let me ride through the wide open country that I love
Don’t fence me in
It appears I still feel that way, particularly when it comes to exercise. Working out in the health club really turns me off.
A new report reveals that exposure to green space reduces the risk of type II diabetes, cardiovascular disease, premature death, preterm birth, stress, and high blood pressure.
Photo by Oleksandr Pidvalnyi on Pexels.com
Populations with higher levels of green space exposure are also more likely to report good overall health – according to global data involving more than 290 million people. Continue reading
How Old Are You Really?
I thought this was an excellent explanation of good health in general and aging in particular.
Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com
Tony
This article was first published in Rotary News on April 2018.
There are two aspects to ageing. Your chronological age is the calculated number of years you have lived. Your biological or “real” age refers to the current condition of your physiological body at its very basic cellular level. These two are not necessarily one and the same. An individual may be chronologically 30, but might have the body and mind of a 55-year-old. He could be overweight, lethargic, with poorly conditioned muscles, poor memory, productivity and low stamina. He may be stressed, depressed, with a laundry list of medical conditions and pills to manage them.
On the contrary, someone could be 50 years old chronologically but have an actual age of a 35-year-old in terms of energy, stamina, strength, and pure joi de vivre.
Factors that ascertain your Real or Biological age
These are blood pressure, heart rate…
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Filed under aging, blood pressure, cholesterol, Exercise, exercise benefits, successful aging
The latest buzz word in health: METABOLIC SYNDROME
Herewith a wonderful write up on Metabolic Syndrome, a medical condition that sadly seems to be gaining in popularity. Dr. Jonathan gives a superb explanation of it and what you can do to avoid succumbing to it.
Tony
The diagnosis metabolic syndrome dates back to the 1950’s. It became more popular around the late 1970’s when the low fat diets first became popular. Today, it is a diagnosis used regularly to define an ever growing percentage of our population. We doctors make it sound like a “disease” requiring our intervention to overcome this life threatening syndrome. In reality, it is a state of dysfunction caused PRIMARILY by the consumer.
What is Metabolic Syndrome? It is a state of diminishing health based on an individual diagnosed with any three of the following five conditions:
elevated blood pressure (≥ 130/85mmHg)
elevated fasting blood sugar (≥100mg/dL)
excess body fat around the waste (abdominal obesity >35 inches in women and >40 inches in men)
HDL cholesterol ≤40 mg/dL for men or 50 mg/dL for women
elevated triglycerides (≥150 mg/dL)
In real numbers, these conditions exist in the United States population as follows:
as of…
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Filed under blood pressure, body fat, cholesterol, fat, HDL Cholesterol, LDL Cholesterol, metabolic syndrome
Caution advised about recent U.S. advice on aggressively lowering blood pressure
Medical researchers at Trinity College Dublin, Ireland, are advising caution when treating blood pressure in some older people — after results from a study contrasted with recent advice from the U.S. to attempt to aggressively lower blood pressure in all adults to targets of 120mmHg.
Researchers from the Irish Longitudinal Study on Ageing (TILDA) at Trinity College Dublin, in collaboration with Beaumont Hospital, Dublin, have recently published the findings in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA Internal Medicine).
A large randomized blood pressure trial led by U.S. investigators — the Systolic blood Pressure Intervention Trial (SPRINT) — demonstrated that lowering systolic blood pressure to levels of 120mmHg or less compared with 140mmHg or less in adults (over 50 years with cardiovascular risk) significantly reduced death (from all causes and from heart failure and heart attacks). The study also reported that common side effects of low blood pressure such as falls, injuries, blackouts, and drops in blood pressure after standing were not increased by aggressive treatment — even in people over 75 years old.
Because the latter findings were clinically counter intuitive, the TILDA team tested whether they held true outside of a trial setting. Focusing on people in Ireland over 75 years, they examined rates of falls, injuries, blackouts and excessive drops in standing blood pressure in those who met the criteria for the treatment proposed in SPRINT and were followed up with for 3½ years — the same time period as SPRINT.
The researchers reported starkly contrasting results — falls and blackouts were up to five times higher than reported in SPRINT and drops in blood pressure on standing were almost double that reported in SPRINT. Therefore, in people over 75 years, intensive lowering of blood pressure to 120mmHg could result in harm and TILDA researchers recommend that a better understanding of who, over 75 years, will or will not benefit, is necessary before widespread adaptation of the SPRINT results.
The TILDA team is now assessing how best to determine which people may benefit from SPRINT, and which people are more at risk from aggressive blood pressure lowering.
First author of the journal article, Research Fellow at TILDA, Dr. Donal Sexton, said: “SPRINT was a landmark study of hypertension treatment. While the benefits of lowering blood pressure seen in this study are not in dispute, we are highlighting to physicians that we need to be cognizant of the fact that the trial was not powered for adverse events such as falls causing injury. Physicians ought not to expect a similarly low rate of adverse events in clinical practice as was observed in the trial when lowering blood pressure in older people. Overall what we are saying is that the risks and benefits of lowering blood pressure should be individualized for each patient.”
Professor Rose Anne Kenny, founding Principal Investigator with TILDA and lead author of the journal article commented: “Our work and that of other groups has shown that low blood pressure and particularly drops in standing blood pressure are linked not only to falls, fractures and fall- and blackout-related injuries, but also to depression and possibly other brain health disorders.”
“These outcomes can seriously impact on independence and quality of life and we advise caution in applying the SPRINT recommendations to everyone over 75 years without detailed assessment of an individual’s risk versus possible benefit until such a time as we can provide more clarity re treatment.”
What Are Calories? How Many Do We Need? – MNT
When I started trying to eat healthy and control my weight, I found that counting calories was a very useful tool. It also happens to be quite easy to use now that I have a smart phone which is always with me. There are all kinds of apps that make calorie counting a snap to do. But, what are calories?
This item from Medical News Today gives a useful answer.
A calorie is a unit of energy. In nutrition and everyday language, calories refer to energy consumption through eating and drinking and energy usage through physical activity. For example, an apple may have 80 calories, while a one mile walk may use up about 100 calories.
15 health benefits of pomegranate juice
I have to confess a great deal of ignorance when it comes to the pomegranate. I haven’t had one in years. I have had some of the juice the comes in very cool shaped bottles.
Today, pomegranate juice is being studied for its many health benefits. It may help with cancer prevention, immune support, and fertility.
Here are some of the potential benefits of pomegranate, according to Medical News Today.
1. Antioxidants
Pomegranate seeds get their vibrant red hue from polyphenols. These chemicals are powerful antioxidants.
Pomegranate juice contains higher levels of antioxidants than most other fruit juices. It also has three times more antioxidants than red wine and green tea. The antioxidants in pomegranate juice can help remove free radicals, protect cells from damage, and reduce inflammation.
Dairy – Good or Bad? – MNT
I started drinking soymilk some years ago after reading some scare stories about cow milk consumption. I don’t even remember the reasons now, but I do look forward to my quarts of soymilk that I buy from Costco. Since starting I can’t put my finger on any negative health effects.
This extensive Medical News Today rundown by Hannah Nichols gives a lot of useful detail on the subject.
What do government health guidelines say? According to the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) food MyPlate guidelines, to get all the nutrients you need from your diet, healthy food and beverage choices should be made from all five food groups, including fruits, vegetables, grains, protein foods, and dairy.
The dairy food group consists of all fluid milk products and many foods that are made from milk. The USDA recommend that food choices from the dairy group should retain their calcium content and be low-fat or fat-free. Fat in milk, yogurt, and cheese that is not low-fat or fat-free will count toward your limit of calories from saturated fats.
Filed under dairy-free myths, milk, milk alternatives
What happens after you quit smoking: A timeline
As regular readers know, I feel strongly that smoking is an unmitigated blight on our lives. We lose over 170,000 people to it every year – just in lung cancer alone – totally preventable. To be honest, I am surprised that anyone who can read would choose to be a smoker. Nonetheless, it is so. I have a Page on it – How many ways does smoking harm you? which I recommend you check out after reading this.
I am reproducing what follows from Medical News Today because I like the way they spell out positive aspects of ceasing smoking. Jenna Fletcher wrote it.
Cigarette smoking is one of the leading causes of preventable death in the United States. Despite this, some smokers find quitting daunting. They think it will take a very long time before seeing improvements in their health and well-being.
However, the timeline for seeing real benefits to quitting smoking is much faster than most people realize. Health benefits begin in as little as an hour after the last cigarette and continue to improve. Continue reading
Home blood pressure monitors inaccurate 70 percent of the time: Study
What to watch out for when choosing and using your own device
Advances in technology have made it possible for us to take measurements of our body that previously we had to rely on doctor visits to get done. This is a positive development that saves us time and money – on the assumption that we can do as accurate a measurement as the hospital. Seems that is not necessarily the case with home blood pressure monitors.
Seventy per cent of readings from home blood pressure monitors are unacceptably inaccurate, which could cause serious implications for people who rely on them to make informed health decisions, new UAlberta research reveals.
“High blood pressure is the number one cause of death and disability in the world,” said medical researcher Jennifer Ringrose, who led the research study. “Monitoring for and treating hypertension can decrease the consequences of this disease. We need to make sure that home blood pressure readings are accurate.” (my emphasis)
Continue reading
Rapid middle age blood pressure drops linked to dementia in old age – Study
Regular readers know how much I follow developments in the study of the brain. Here is some fresh fascinating info from Johns Hopkins.
Summary: Researchers report orthostatic hypotension could cause lasting damage to the brain because it can reduce blood flow to the brain.
Middle-aged people who experience temporary blood pressure drops that often cause dizziness upon standing up may be at an increased risk of developing cognitive decline and dementia 20 years later, new Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health research suggests.
The findings, being presented March 10 at the American Heart Association’s EPI|LIFESTYLE 2017 Scientific Sessions in Portland, Ore., suggest that these temporary episodes – known as orthostatic hypotension – may cause lasting damage, possibly because they reduce needed blood flow to the brain. Previous research has suggested a connection between orthostatic hypotension and cognitive decline in older people, but this appears to be the first to look at long-term associations. (my emphasis)
Filed under blood pressure, cognitive decline, dementia, high blood pressure
Guys – Get that check up
I started writing this blog for guys nearly seven years ago. The idea was that women did a great job of keeping track of their health; men, not so much. Over the course of writing it, I have found that more than half of my readers are women who are paying attention to their health, so the focus shifted from guys to simply good health and living past 100. But, according to this little infographic, guys still don’t do a very good job. With 34% of men over age 20 overweight or obese, guys need to wake up.
I hope this little Men’s Health 101 from Texas A&M University Health Science Center gives you a wake up call.
Tony
Filed under blood pressure, medical check ups, men's health, overweight, Weight, weight loss
Clinic readings may underestimate blood pressure during daily activities – AHA
Ignorance about blood pressure is widespread.
Harvard Medical School reports “Blood pressure has long been one of the best markers of your health. It is a number you can remember and monitor. High blood pressure (hypertension) is linked to a greater risk of heart attacks and strokes.
“About one out of three adults has high blood pressure, which is usually defined as a reading of 140/90 millimeters of mercury (mm Hg) or higher.”
You can have high blood pressure, or hypertension, and still feel just fine, according to the National Institute on Aging (NIA). That’s because high blood pressure often does not cause signs of illness that you can see or feel. But, high blood pressure, sometimes called “the silent killer,” is very common in older people and a major health problem.
Study Highlights
• 24-hour ambulatory, or around-the-clock monitoring, during daily activities revealed undetected high blood pressure among otherwise healthy adults who had normal readings in the clinic.
• Healthcare providers should be aware that normal blood-pressure tests in the clinic may not rule out high blood pressure among otherwise healthy patients. Continue reading
Filed under blood pressure, Exercise
What is High Blood Pressure?
Blood pressure is one of the critical and least understood aspects of our health. For that reason, I am reblogging this post I wrote five years ago. This is a perfect example of ‘what you don’t know can hurt you.’
Tony
Blood pressure is the force of the blood pushed against the the wall of the arteries, according to Nurse Practicioner Deborah Bergman, MS, RN, speaking to the Northwestern Memorial Healthy Transitions Program®.
Bergman explained that blood pressure depends on the strength of the heartbeat, thickness and volume of the blood, the elasticity of the artery walls and general health. It is the arterial pressure of the circulation. It is a dynamic process and fluctuates all day.
She said that blood pressure (BP) varies between a maximum (systolic) pressure – working phase. And the minimum (diastolic) pressure – the resting phase. Average blood pressure decreases as the blood moves away from the heart through the arteries. It drops most rapidly around the small arteries and continues to decrease as it moves through the capillaries and back to the heart through the veins.
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Filed under aging, blood pressure, Exercise, exercise benefits, high blood pressure
