TREAT HIGH BLOOD PRESSURE WITH DIET.
Report #6708 1/20/96
A recent report in the American Journal of Epidemiology shows that high systolic blood pressure is more likely to cause strokes than high diastolic blood pressure. (1)
Doctors measure two blood pressures: a higher systolic when your heart contracts/ and a lower diastolic when your heart relaxes. High systolic blood pressure is usually caused by arteriosclerosis. When you heart contracts, it pushes a huge volume of blood into the main arteries of your body. To keep your blood pressure from rising too high, your arteries swell like balloons. When you have arteriosclerosis, thick plaques line your arteries and make them stiff so they cannot balloon out when the heart contracts. This causes your blood pressure to rise higher than normal. So, arteriosclerosis causes high blood pressure, rather than the other way around. People who have high systolic blood pressures usually have plaques, so they are at increased risk for strokes. The usual treatment is to lower cholesterol to dissolve the plaques. Then, the blood vessels regain their elasticity and blood pressure drops. You do this by eating a very low-fat diet and losing weight because low-fat diets and weight reduction lower high blood pressure to normal in most patients (2). The vast majority of Americans will not have their blood pressure rise after taking extra salt (3) nor will they have their high blood pressure reduced significantly by restricting salt. (4,5,6) A low-fat diet is more effective in lowering high blood pressure than restricting salt or even taking most drugs used to treat high blood pressure. (7,8)
By Gabe Mirkin, M.D., for CBS Radio News
1) E Lindenstrom, G Boysen, J Nyboe. Influence of systolic and diastolic blood pressure
on stroke risk: A prospective observational study. American Journal of Epidemiology 142:
12 (DEC 15 1995):1279-1290.
2) Wt and dietary fat more important. Hypertension 1991;18(suppl 1):115-120.
3) Science 1982(April);216(2):38-40.
4) Silman AJ, Locke C, Mitchel P. Humpherson P. Evaluation of the effectiveness of a
low- sodium diet in the treatment of mild to moderate hypertension. Lancet 1983(May
28):1179.
5) BR Davis, A Oberman, MD Blaufox, S Wassertheilsmoller, N Zimbaldi, K Kirchner, J
Wylierosett, HG Langford. Lack of effectiveness of a low-sodium high-potassium diet in
reducing antihypertensive medication requirements in overweight persons with mild
hypertension. American Journal of Hypertension 1994(Oct);7(10 Part 1):926-932. This study
provides no support for the sole use of a low-sodium/ high-potassium diet as a practical
therapeutic strategy in maintaining blood pressure control in the moderately obese.
6) JD Swales. Salt and blood pressure revisited. Journal of Human Hypertension 9: 6 (JUN
1995):517-5214.
7) Wt and dietary fat more important. Hypertension 1991;18 (suppl 1):115-120.
8) Effect of weight loss on blood pressure and insulin resistance in normotensive and hypertensive obese individuals. American Journal of Hypertension 8: 11 (NOV 1995):1067-1071.