in America about 1/3 of all adults have high blood pressure

Italian researchers from the University of Pavia say that if you are overweight and suffering from high blood pressure you may only need to shed a little body mass to get your blood pressure down to a healthy level.

The team of researchers led by Professor Roberto Fogari looked at over 200 overweight men and women. The clinical classification of overweight is recording a Body Mass Index of between 25 and 30, and none of the volunteers were obese with a BMI of 30+. The researchers asked the volunteers all of whom who had stage 1 hypertension to shed a minimum of five percent of their overall body weight over a six month period. In order to achieve this weight loss the team of researchers gave the volunteers sensible weight loss advice and some of them were even prescribed the weight loss drug Xenical.

After six months when the volunteers were examined again it was seen that almost 60 percent of the women and just over 50 percent of the men actually did manage to lose five percent of their body weight. Of the successful participants just over half of them had completely normal blood pressure showing that their hypertension was caused by being overweight.

Professor Roberto Fogari presented the findings of his research at the American Heart Association’s Annual Conference which focused specifically on hypertension research. This type of research is extremely important because it shows how being overweight can affect blood pressure dramatically.

Many overweight people blame their high blood pressure on other things such as eating too much salt or being under a great deal of stress when in fact they should realise that their problem stems from their weight and they should be concentrating on changing their eating patterns.

It is estimated that in America about 1/3 of all adults have high blood pressure and many of them have absolutely no idea that they are suffering from this condition. You should get your blood pressure checked at regular intervals.