With so much attention on healthcare reform, perhaps we ought to focus on personal lifestyle reform! The Nurses’ Health Study has yet again yielded evidence in favor of a healthy lifestyle. Almost 84,000 women were followed for 14 years. Those who had the lowest risk of hypertension were those who followed basic modifiable risk factors such as body mass index (BMI) of less than 25, 30 minutes of vigorous exercise per day, compliance with the DASH diet, low use of non-narcotic pain meds, and intake of 400 microg/day of folic acid. Interestingly, the risk for hypertension was 5 times higher in women who were obese compared to those with normal BMI.
PositiveTip: Think again before taking that second serving of even the good things, and certainly the first serving of dessert! Those choices may prevent hypertension.