High blood pressure prevention health knowledge lecture

90% of essential hypertension is preventable. As long as you make daily practical lifestyle adjustments, you can reduce the risk of the disease by more than 40%. There is no need to wait for high blood pressure to take medicine to cover it up.

I have been managing chronic diseases in the community for 8 years, and what I say are all real-life experiences, not empty words from books. I just met a 32-year-old Internet programmer last week. I worked on a project for half a month. One day I felt dizzy and took out the blood pressure monitor at home. It was 150/95mmHg. My face turned pale on the spot. I grabbed my sleeve and asked if I should take antihypertensive drugs for the rest of my life. I listed 3 adjustment requirements for him without gritting my teeth, and I didn’t prescribe a single pill. I came back for a review two months later. His blood pressure was stable at 120/80mmHg, and his overall mental state was different.

Speaking of this, some people must ask, do we have to say goodbye to heavy talk completely and spend time in the gym every day to prevent it? Not really. Take the most familiar "salt restriction" as an example. There are actually two voices in the academic circles: one is to strictly follow the WHO standards, and the daily sodium intake should not exceed 5 grams, which is about the amount of a beer bottle cap. ； There is also a school of thought that as long as there are no basic problems with kidney function, there is no need to limit this number. The key is to avoid invisible salt. In clinical practice, I prefer the latter option - after all, no one can persist in asking the aunts and uncles who have been eating heavy food for half their lives to reduce the salt to a bland level. Instead, it is better to first dig out the "invisible salt" hidden in prunes, pickles, take-out sauces, and instant noodle seasoning packets. There used to be an aunt who paid special attention to salt when cooking and used a spoon to measure the grams of salt every day, but her blood pressure remained high. After careful questioning, I found out that she drank porridge with pickles every day. She stopped picking pickles for half a month and then took another test. Her systolic blood pressure dropped by 12mmHg, which is much more than adding half a pill.

Oh, by the way, I almost forgot to mention the misconceptions about exercise. Many people think that to prevent high blood pressure, they have to run 5 kilometers and do iron exercises for an hour every day. If they don’t have that time, they simply don’t do it. Many patients I have come into contact with just walk downstairs for 20 minutes after meals every day, and take less elevators for work than two flights of stairs and climb more stairs. After half a year, their diastolic blood pressure can be reduced by an average of 5-8mmHg. The effect is really not bad. Of course, some experts in the field of sports medicine have suggested that high-intensity interval training twice a week is 30% more effective in lowering blood pressure than long-term slow walking. However, for people who have never exercised before, choosing something that can be sustained first is much better than blindly following the trend until you get injured.

Another controversial point is drinking. People often tell me that "drinking a small amount of red wine softens blood vessels." I have to say this objectively: The latest domestic and foreign guidelines for the prevention and control of hypertension are clear that as long as alcohol is consumed, blood pressure will rise. There is no "safe drinking amount".” ； However, some people in the field of traditional Chinese medicine believe that a small amount of warm yellow rice wine can ventilate qi and blood, and will have little effect on some people with weak and cold constitutions. You can choose according to your physical condition, but at least the bottom line is not to drink too much - I have seen too many people go to the emergency room with their blood pressure soaring to 180mmHg after a heavy drink. I am really not trying to scare people. As for smoking, there are no benefits at all. Smoking one cigarette can raise blood pressure by 10mmHg, and the effect can last for half an hour. This is an objective fact that has been repeatedly verified, and there is nothing to dispute.

Many people think that high blood pressure is caused by eating and being lazy. In fact, mood and sleep account for at least 30% of the impact. Last month, I met the senior class teacher of a key middle school. She eats regularly and exercises regularly. She leads her graduating class to stay up until 12 o'clock every day to correct papers, and she also gets angry with naughty students. Her blood pressure was at the critical value of 145/90mmHg three times in a row. As a result, she rested at home for a month during the summer vacation and did not take any medicine. When tested again, it was completely normal. If you are under a lot of pressure at work, often stay up late, and lose your temper easily, don't take it seriously. Your blood vessels are much more "sensitive" than you think.

In fact, after all is said and done, preventing high blood pressure is really not a difficult task that requires gritting one's teeth, and you don't have to believe in the folk remedies on the Internet that "eating celery and drinking corn silk water can lower blood pressure", just change a few small habits that you can stick to. If there is a family history of high blood pressure in your family, or if you have reached the critical value, you should check your blood pressure at home more often. Don't buy random medicines by yourself. Find a community doctor to adjust the plan. Most people can keep their blood pressure within the normal range. What I said today are all honest words. If you can tell the boss "put less sauce and less salt" when ordering takeout tomorrow after listening to it, then my lecture will be considered in vain.