The High Blood Pressure And Sodium Connection: Is Salt Raising Your Blood Pressure
Copyright 2006 Frank Mangano
You can have your cake and eat it too -- well at least you can lower your blood pressure and have your salt too. That is what recent research is telling us about sodium's role in managing blood pressure. Hypertension, it turns out, is not caused by too much salt. Neither is it lowered by simply cutting salt out of your diet. So how is it that table salt (sodium) is still getting such a bad rap and being linked to high blood pressure? The real culprit it turns out is not salt, but how your body manages sodium and its proportion to the amount of potassium, calcium and magnesium in your body.
Scientists have discovered that deficiencies in potassium, calcium and magnesium have a much greater impact on blood pressure than the mineral salt.
These other minerals are so important in controlling blood pressure that when they are out of balance with each other, they can make salt more of a threat to healthy blood pressure.
The fact is that only about 10 percent of the population is considered "salt sensitive." It is this relatively small group that has to watch their salt intake for a variety of reasons, including its impact on blood pressure.
There are some easy ways to make sure all of the important minerals in your body are in balance. These include:
1. Eating a well-balanced diet with a variety of foods. This will ensure that you are getting a wide range of nutrients and not just one or two key elements.
2. Making sure you get enough calcium -- 2000 mg per day.
Calcium is essential to bone density, but in relationship to blood pressure, it is believed that low calcium levels can actually cause high blood pressure. Calcium is a natural diuretic, so when salt is consumed, even larger quantities, having enough calcium signals the kidneys to get rid of the excess sodium. Also, calcium prevents a certain hormone that raises blood pressure from being released and doing its damage.
3. Getting plenty of potassium. Studies have shown that diets high in potassium and lower in sodium can prevent many diseases and keep blood pressure lower.
On the other hand, when there is much more sodium than potassium, blood pressure goes up. Balance the two, and you can make great strides in controlling hypertension.
Here are some food suggestions for getting enough of these essential minerals:
Calcium -- Aside from dairy products, which can be high in fat and hard on the digestive system, broccoli, spinach, and salmon are good sources.
Magnesium -- Foods such as whole grains, nuts and black beans will help you get the beneficial 400-800 mg daily of magnesium.
Potassium -- bananas, potatoes, orange juice, and cantaloupe all provide potassium. Potassium is the most substantiated mineral in controlling blood pressure.
When even good food choices leave you feeling you are lacking in important minerals, supplements can pick up the slack. Whether through food choices or supplements, getting enough minerals into your diet is necessary to counteract the impact of sodium in the battle with high blood pressure.
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Junk Foods Kill.
All of the following are health hazards.Fatty foodsHigh salt levelsSugar and most artificial sweeteners. Americans now consume roughly 25 times as much sugar and equivalents as was typical around 1900, which is not healthful. Refined sugar, high fructose syrup, and the three major artificial "no calorie" sweeteners (aspartame,saccharin, and sucralose) release chemicals into the body, and high usage has been implicated in headaches, cancers, lupus, and multiple sclerosis.Anyone wanting to lose weight should not ingest any sweetsthat are not natural to foods, such as fresh or dried fruits.Instead of candy, try a handful of raisins and almonds, nutswhich provide beneficial Omega-3 fatty acids like those found in fish.It is interesting that children taking drugs for "Attention Deficit Hyper Activity Disorder" (ADHD), such as Ritalin, often get better when all processed sugars are removed from their diets, and the drugs stopped.******************************************* Diet with FACTS,...
Junk Foods Kill.
Diets > Junk Foods Kill.
Protein - The Denominator Customary to All Diets
The Human Body is in a constant flux with the environment. Matter and molecules flow in and out, casting themselves into its complexities. Although the body lends them structure, it is the intake?the diet?that decides its physique. To control what goes in a diet is to choose what stays inside. Dietary decisions reflect an awareness of metabolism and the nutrients needed to modify it.
There may be a host of diets purported for each activity and illness. However, the one macronutrient that is invariably required, in substantial amounts irrespective of the physiological state, is protein.Proteins hold this special place in every diet for a variety of reasons. They connect the DNA to the rest of the cell and modulate all cellular functions and responses. They are the scaffolds of the human body that struts a billion cells. Proteins are also the workers that shuffle around the body relaying messages, carrying out repairs and digestion.
Oxygen from the lungs and many nutrients...
Protein - The Denominator Customary to All Diets
Diets > Protein - The Denominator Customary to All Diets
The Skinny on Oats, Oatmeal, Vitamins Nutrition for Skin Care and Bath Products.
Oats (botanical name Avena sativa)An oat is a grass that produces a fibrous root and a hollow jointed stem with narrow, flat, pale-green leaves. Oats are native to southern Europe and eastern Asia. They are widely cultivated as a food.An oat is an edible cereal grain produced by the cereal grass of the same name. They are light colored and have a nutty flavor and a chewy texture.Usually we think of them as breakfast food but oatmeal has long been known for its skin-soothing properties. Many skin lotions and ointments are formulated with oats for it's skin healing properties.
As a nutritious breakfast food oats provide a healthy addition to your diet in that there is 140 calories per 1/2 cup serving. They also provide 4g of dietary fiber, of which 2g of this is soluble fiber and 2g is insoluble. Insoluble fibers are those that cannot be dissolved in water. And soluble fibers can be dissolved in water. They provide 10% of your daily iron needs.
Also of this 1/2 cup serving,...
The Skinny on Oats, Oatmeal, Vitamins Nutrition for Skin Care and Bath Products.
Diets > The Skinny on Oats, Oatmeal, Vitamins Nutrition for Skin Care and Bath Products.
The Original Ceylon Tea Company Introduces: 3 Delicious New Ways to Savor the Health Benefits of Green Tea
The fact that green tea provides fabulous health properties is undisputed.
But, when it comes to taste, it's simply not everyone's cup of tea.The Original Ceylon Tea Company is out to change all that with the introduction of its Green Line?three pure, high mountain-grown green teas from Ceylon (Sri Lanka) featuring natural Lemon, Raspberry and Jasmine flavoring."Green tea is such a healthy drink," says The Original Ceylon Tea Company president Kit Riley, "but not everyone loves the flavor.
With our Green Line, we're going to give them 3 reasons to love drinking green tea and they'll get the health benefits as an added bonus."What makes green tea such a powerful addition to healthy lifestyles is that it is rich in catechin polyphenols, particularly epigallocatechin gallate (EGCG).
EGCG is a powerful antioxidant that provides health benefits beyond the ability to neutralize free radicals.
It is also shown to limit cancer tumor growth, inhibit cancer...
Diets > The Original Ceylon Tea Company Introduces: 3 Delicious New Ways to Savor the Health Benefits of Green Tea
Take Back Your Life 3
In parts one and two of this series, titled "Take Back Your Life" and "Take Back Your Life 2"; we discussed the importance of proper cell function and the necessity of having and maintaining a balanced endocrine system as they relate to wellness. Here in part 3, we shall examine why vitamins and minerals, including certain trace minerals are absolutely necessary to further insure and maintain a state of wellness and optimum health.
Fresh foods have, in the past, been the main source that provided vitamins and minerals essential to the properly functioning, healthy human body. These nutrients, naturally occurring in some fresh fruits and vegetables, can and have, in the past given our bodies what was needed for health and vitality. Today, however, because of modern farming, harvesting, storage, and food processing methods, our formally nutrient rich food sources contain lower levels of some vitamins and minerals for supporting and maintaining good health.
We still need...
Take Back Your Life 3
Diets > Take Back Your Life 3
To Diet or Not to Diet and the Right Answer
It's that time of the year again ? the sun is shining, our mood is rising and we want to throw away the layers of winter clothes and with them the extra kilos that have somehow managed to sneak in again?Suddenly we are all ears for the latest diet out there. This one WILL work for us. This time we are more determined, more worked up. So we start big, armed with books, tips, gym gear, calorie counting and panting our way to slimness. And we get tired and mentally exhausted -not so much from exercising or calorie counting but from having to think about food all the time.
Diets can become very obsessive, mentally and physically exhausting. But what is more ? they create havoc with our metabolism. The more we diet the less efficient our metabolism is so unless we plan to keep this diet for the rest of our life, then we are definitely going to regain our pre-diet weight and even some more?The other thing about diets is that they expect us all to be the same and react the same way to...
To Diet or Not to Diet and the Right Answer
Diets > To Diet or Not to Diet and the Right Answer
Fast Weight Loss Through Thinking Thin!
Fast Weight Loss Through Thinking Thin!
This time you are serious about achieving fast weight loss?You're heading out on a big trip, and you've glanced at thelatest South Beach Diet book to see if this just might be the answer to your prayers.Fast weight loss is achieveable, but so is long-term weightloss.There's nothing worse than losing 5 pounds, only to gain itback within 4 weeks.So how do you summon the focus to begin fast weight loss and the dedication to stick with itfor the long-term?Overcoming most challenges in life depend on having the right mental attitude, beliefs and motivation.
Here are 4 steps you can use to set the foundation for fastweight loss:1. Understand Pain Versus PleasureMost behaviors in life occur either because we are trying to avoid pain or achieve pleasure.
In fact, our opinion of how painful or how pleasurable something is has a major impact on our committment andactions.So, your chance of achieving fast... Fast Weight Loss Through Thinking Thin!
Diets > Fast Weight Loss Through Thinking Thin!
Jewels and Pinstripes Gift Bags Elicit Big Cheers at the Chris Evert/Bank of America Pro-Celebrity Tennis Classic
Boca Raton, FL (ContentDesk) December 5, 2005 -- Jewels and Pinstripes, one of the nations premier gift bag companies, announced today that the gift bags it created for the Chris Evert/Bank of America Tennis Classic charity event, which took place from December 2 - 4 at the Delray Beach Tennis Center and the Boca Raton Resort & Club, were a major crowd pleaser among all recipients.Athletes and celebrities such as President H.W. Bush, Sean Diddy Combs, Lindsay Davenport, Scott Foley and Stone...
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Diets > Jewels and Pinstripes Gift Bags Elicit Big Cheers at the Chris Evert/Bank of America Pro-Celebrity Tennis Classic
PodcastDesign.com Signs 6 Clients in First 48 Hours of Existence
The phone would simply not stop ringing, and the email was overwhelming.The HTML was written, the pages were formed, and the site was FTPd. It then took less than 2 hours for David Lawrence, the founder and lead podcast designer for PodcastDesign.com (http://www.podcastdesign.com), to sign his first client, and less than 2 days to sign 5 more."Podcasting has the kind of heat that surrounded blogging, streaming, Napster and Google. Everyone's...
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Diets > PodcastDesign.com Signs 6 Clients in First 48 Hours of Existence
How to Watch PC Movies on Any DVD Player: VSO-Software: New ConvertXtoDVD Version 2.0
(ContentDesk) February 20, 2006 -- VSO ConvertXtoDVD is a new version of the popular tool which converts and then burns video files that were originally only playable on a PC so that they become playable on any DVD Player. ConvertXtoDVD handles most of the digital multimedia formats in everyday life, extending its support beyond AVI files, XVid, MPEG 1/2/4, VOB, MOV, and now includes the formats WMV 3, HD and others. In our previous version we clearly underestimated the popularity of the WMV...
Diets The High Blood Pressure And Sodium Connection: Is Salt Raising Your Blood Pressure
Diets > How to Watch PC Movies on Any DVD Player: VSO-Software: New ConvertXtoDVD Version 2.0
eCycle, Inc. Announces its Lightest 11kW B Brushless Motor - Enables Many Aerospace Applications
Temple, PA (ContentDesk) January 2, 2006 -- eCycle recently announced its newest brushless motor designed for aerospace applications. Based on the CMG Silicon Series brushless motor generator, the EA Series (eCycle Aerospace) brushless motor weighs only 10.5lbs and produces 11kW at 6,500rpm. The EA brushless motor was originally developed for an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) to enable vertical take off and landing (VTOL) operations. The EA brushless motor shares many of the same features found...
Diets The High Blood Pressure And Sodium Connection: Is Salt Raising Your Blood Pressure
Diets > eCycle, Inc. Announces its Lightest 11kW B Brushless Motor - Enables Many Aerospace Applications