Alcohol And High Blood Pressure

Being aware of the symptoms of high blood pressure and its causes are the best tools we can have in order to avoid high blood pressure. We can deter its debilitating effects if we know its causes before the symptoms of high blood pressure takes place.The common symptoms of high blood pressure, which is about 90 percent of high blood pressure cases, emanate from essential hypertension. Essential hypertension is due to excess weight, heredity, lack of exercise or poor diet as examples. Other symptoms of high blood pressure may come from secondary hypertension wherein it is a by-product of  ailments like adrenal tumor, kidney disease or constriction of the aorta, just to name a few. Secondary hypertension accounts for about 10 percent of high blood pressure cases.As a “silent killer”, from a total of roughly 50 million Americans, 30 million was diagnosed with high blood pressure due to lack of awareness. The remaining 20 million will only be informed of the situation if they visit a doctor for medical check-up, e.g. stroke, heart attack, insurance purposes or any health related problems.   Normally, the rise in the blood pressure is gradual until the body manifests the ongoing change. However, when the diastolic blood pressure or the lower pressure of the heart’s pumping chamber, is 70 in any given day and rises to 105 on the following day, any one or more the following symptoms will be experienced:1. Headaches that occur during mornings2. Incessant dull sound in the ears3. Dizzy spells4. Impulsive bleeding of the nose5. Unfounded depression or tension6. Blurred and haziness of vision7. Unexplained red face8. Temporary loss of consciousness or “blacking out”With regards to the causes, it is usually the accumulation of many factors combined over the years, like:1. Alcoholic tendencies and over indulgence to alcohol2. Disproportion or imbalance in the dietary fat3. Excessive salt and low sodium-potassium balance4. Excessive Body weight or Obesity5. Genetic deficiency or hereditary factor6. Too much insulin  in the body7. Unbalanced nutrition8. Sedentary lifestyle due to lack of exercise9. Too much pressure or stress10.Having a type “A’ personality or always going to the extremesIn order to reverse high blood pressure, one should also have a reverse or change in diet and lifestyle. By deliberately doing this, chances are that it will have a positive impact of about 85 percent.  While the remaining 15 percent can be treated with the use of medications.As a rule, the eventual reduction and cure of high blood pressure lie on the actions one undertakes. Better yet, knowing the symptoms and causes will help in the avoidance of having high blood pressure.

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High blood pressure, also called hypertension, is elevated pressure of the blood in the arteries. Hypertension results from two major factors, which can be present independently or together:

• The heart pumps blood with excessive force

• The body’s smaller blood vessels (known as the arterioles) narrow, so that blood flow exerts more pressure against the vessels’ walls

High blood pressure or hypertension means high pressure (tension) in the arteries. The arteries are the vessels that carry blood from the pumping heart to all of the tissues and organs of the body.

Symptoms

Migraine pain tends to intensify over the first 30 minutes to several hours, and may last from several hours to a day or longer. Afterward, the affected person is usually weary, and sensitive to sudden head movements.

Hypertension has aptly been called the “silent killer” because it usually produces no symptoms. Untreated hypertension increases slowly over the years. It is important for anyone with risk factors to have their blood pressure checked regularly and to make appropriate lifestyle changes. Such recommendations are especially important for individuals who have prehypertension or hypertension.

Migraine without aura may be preceded by elevations in mood or energy level for up to 24 hours before the attack. Other pre-migraine symptoms may include fatigue, depression, and excessive yawning.

Risk Factors

During the last decade, the number of Americans with high blood pressure has increased by 30 percent. Over 65 million American adults now have high blood pressure, and this condition affects close to 1 billion people worldwide. Less than half of these people are on medication, however, and only about half of this group has their blood pressure under good control with such drugs.

Age and Gender

Age is the major risk factor of hypertension. Blood pressure increases with age in both men and women, and in fact, the lifetime risk for hypertension is nearly 90%. Two-thirds of Americans over age 60 have hypertension. Older women (60 years and above) currently have the highest rates of hypertension, and mortality rates from hypertension are higher in women than in men.

Ethnicity

Compared to Caucasians, African Americans have 1.8 times the rate of fatal stroke, 1.5 times the risk for fatal heart disease, and 4.2 times the rates of end-stage kidney disease. In general, about 34% of African American men and women have hypertension; it may account for over 40% of all deaths in this group. The prevalence of high blood pressure among African Americans is among the highest in the world.

Causes

In 90 to 95 percent of high blood pressure cases, the cause is unknown. In fact, you can have high blood pressure for years without knowing it. That’s why it’s the “silent killer” — it creeps up on you. Factors that may lead to high blood pressure in the remaining 5–10 percent of cases, which are known as secondary hypertension, include:

• Kidney abnormality

• A structural abnormality of the aorta (large blood vessel leaving the heart) existing since birth

• Narrowing of certain arteries

These problems can usually be corrected. For example, doctors can repair a narrowed artery that supplies blood to a kidney. Most of these problems can be ruled out by a careful history, a physical examination and a few tests.

Hypertension is referred to as essential (primary) when the doctor is unable to identify a specific cause. It is by far the most common type of high blood pressure. The causes of this type are unknown but are likely to be a complex combination of genetic, environmental, and other factors.

Hypertension is referred to as essential (primary) when the doctor is unable to identify a specific cause. It is by far the most common type of high blood pressure. The causes of this type are unknown but are likely to be a complex combination of genetic, environmental, and other factors.High blood pressure is a ‘risk factor’ for developing a cardiovascular disease (such as a heart attack or stroke), and kidney damage, sometime in the future. If you have high blood pressure, over the years it may have a damaging effect to arteries and put a strain on your heart. In general, the higher your blood pressure, the greater the health risks. But, high blood pressure is just one of several possible risk factors for developing a cardiovascular disease.If those temporary episodes occur frequently, they can cause just as much damage to your blood vessels, heart and kidneys as can chronic high blood pressure. In addition, when you have anxiety, you’re more likely to resort to other unhealthy habits, such as smoking, drinking or overeating — which, in turn, can increase your risk of high blood pressure.Even if high blood pressure does cause symptoms, the symptoms are usually mild and nonspecific (vague, or suggesting many different disorders).Malignant hypertension may be associated with headache, light-headedness, or nausea.Certain nerve impulses cause your arteries to dilate (become larger) or contract (become smaller). If these vessels are wide open, blood can flow through easily. If they’re narrow, it’s harder for the blood to flow through them, and the pressure inside them increases. Then high blood pressure may occur. When this happens, your heart becomes strained and blood vessels may become damaged. Changes in the vessels that supply blood to your kidneys and brain may cause these organs to be affected.In 90–95 percent of cases, scientists don’t know what causes high blood pressure. This is essential hypertension. Fortunately, although scientists don’t fully understand the causes of this disease, they’ve developed both non-drug and drug treatments that treat it effectively. They’ve also identified some factors that contribute to higher blood pressure. These are arteriosclerosis (or hardening of the arteries), thickening or hypertrophy of the artery wall, and excess contraction of the arterioles (small arteries).Essential hypertension affects approximately 75 million Americans, yet its basic causes or underlying defects are not always known. Nevertheless, certain associations have been recognized in people with essential hypertension. For example, essential hypertension develops only in groups or societies that have a fairly high intake of salt, exceeding 5.8 grams daily. In fact, salt intake may be a particularly important factor in relation to essential hypertension in several situations.Hypertension is referred to as essential (primary) when the doctor is unable to identify a specific cause. It is by far the most common type of high blood pressure. The causes of this type are unknown but are likely to be a complex combination of genetic, environmental, and other factors.The cause of high blood pressure often cannot be found in many teens with hypertension. When the cause is unknown, a person has what’s called essential or primary hypertension. In cases where the cause of high blood pressure is known (called secondary hypertension), it is usually the result of kidney problems, hormonal disorders, abnormalities of the aorta (the main artery that carries oxygenated blood to the body), or a narrowing of certain smaller arteries. Most teens that are diagnosed with hypertension have essential hypertension.

As a first step, let’s talk about your heart.Your heart is an organ that is mostly muscle tissue. It is a pump. In very simple terms its job is to receive incoming blood from the body that is low in oxygen and pump it to the lungs.As it passes through the lungs the blood gets rid of carbon dioxide and picks up oxygen. Then the blood goes back to the heart and the heart pumps the oxygen rich blood out to the entire body.Blood flows through arteries going out from the heart to various parts of the body, and through veins on the way back to the heart.The heart pumps blood by the rhythmic contraction of the four chambers in the heart. It is the strong contractions of the lower two chambers (called ventricles) that pumps the blood out of and away from the heart to the various parts of the body.There is a great deal of pressure created by the contraction of the ventricles. and it is this pressure that pushes the blood through the miles of arteries within the body. It is the pressure, the force of the blood pushing against the inside walls of your arteries, that is being discussed when we talk about blood “pressure.”What do the numbers mean?You’ve probably heard the sound of a heart beating at some time. It sounds sort of like: lub-DUB, lub-DUB, lub-DUB, lub-DUB. The “lub” is the sound of the auricles beating and pumping the blood into the bigger, more powerful chambers, the ventricles. The “DUB” is the sound of the ventricles beating, and pumping the blood away from the heart (see the above illustration).When the powerful ventricles contract (the “DUB”), that is the moment of greatest pressure called the “systolic pressure.” Between one “lub-DUB” and the next “lub-DUB” is a moment when the heart is not beating at all, that is the moment of lowest pressure called the “diastolic pressure.” When doctors or nurses measure your blood pressure, they usually give it to you as two numbers, the “systolic” over the “diastolic” or the high over the low measurements.These numbers fall into certain ranges:What controls blood pressure?Blood pressure is controlled by tiny muscles that line the inside of your blood vessels.These muscles allow your arteries to operate like soft rubber tubes, that expand with each beat of your heart.When these muscles throughout the vascular system [the arteries and veins that carry blood] expand, blood pressure drops. When these muscles throughout the vascular system tense up, blood pressure rises.When these muscles get tense, the arteries become narrower, more rigid, less flexible, and the heart has to beat harder to keep the blood flowing through these narrower tubes.If the muscles that line your arteries are tense all the time, the blood pressure will remain high. This is called hypertension!Continuous high blood pressure puts extra strain, wear and tear on your heart and arteries, that can eventually lead to heart attacks and strokes.What Causes High Blood Pressure?What is it that makes the muscles that line your blood vessels tense all the time? What are the things that can actually drive your blood pressure up? * Poor diet* Nutritional deficiencies* Being overweight* Alcohol and caffeine in excess* Emotional and physical stress* Being diabeticEach of the above can cause the loss of vital minerals from the body. These minerals are essential to the natural and effective control of blood pressure.”Magnesium is essential for cells to maintain proper balances of other minerals such as potassium, sodium, and calcium.” “When cells are deficient in magnesium, this balance is disrupted, and cells lose potassium and are flooded with calcium and sodium.” “In the smooth muscle cells of the blood vessels, this sets the stage for constriction and elevation of blood pressure.” excerpted from The Magnesium Solutionby Jay S. Cohen, M.D.Not having enough magnesium is one of the main causes of high blood pressure.”As many as half of us in the United States are magnesium deficient.”"Our soils are becoming depleted of magnesium, which eliminates the natural opportunity to receive magnesium from fruits, vegetables, and water.”excerpted from The Sinatra Solutionby Stephen T. Sinatra, M.D.Blood Pressure DrugsToday, most people with high blood pressure are only treating the symptoms and not getting to the root of the problem. Furthermore, many hypertension medications given to people with high blood pressure are adding to the problem instead of getting to the root cause. All blood pressure medications are man-made chemicals. They are alien substances in your body. They attempt to directly address the high blood pressure (which is a symptom) rather than what is causing the high blood pressure.Some of these medications will do this by slowing your heart beat, others by interfering with nerve impulses to your arteries, and still others by removing water from your body, or blocking biochemical reactions, or preventing calcium from entering the cells that make up the walls of your arteries.All blood pressure medications have side effects. Some of these side effects are so strong that they negatively impact your quality of life. Often, two or three of these drugs are prescribed to be used at the same time, which creates even more side effects as a result of the chemical interactions between the drugs.