Maybe your doctor has just started to make comments about your pressure.
Or perhaps he’s already put you on a hypertension drug that makes you feel dizzy and sick but isn’t doing enough to bring your numbers down.
Either way, you’d give anything for an effective solution to your high blood pressure problems.
Well, it turns out you ALREADY have one squirreled away in your medicine cabinet right now. And despite conventional medicine’s constant push to pile on the meds, this one doesn’t have a thing to do with drugs.
Because according to an exciting new study your TOOTHBRUSH could be the key to sending your blood pressure plummeting.
The new research, published in the journal Hypertension, gathered data from over 3,600 folks with high blood pressure.
The researchers plowed through a stack of medical and dental records. And before long, two surprising patterns began to emerge.
Those people with the best gum health
- had lower blood pressure
- responded better to blood pressure medications
And that was in stark contrast to those folks whose oral routines had left them with gum disease problems.
Gum disease linked to high blood pressure
In fact, people with the common gum disease that dentists call periodontitis were 20 percent less likely to have healthy blood pressure numbers than those with good oral health.
Now if you’ve been monitoring your own blood pressure you probably already know your target is to bring your blood pressure numbers to below 130/80 mmHg.
The upper number, your systolic pressure, measures the force of your blood against your artery walls.
Those folks in the study who took meds for hypertension but had the worst gum disease problems had systolic pressures that were on average 3 mmHg higher than those whose mouths were clean as a whistle.
And although that number may look small, it actually can make a massive difference. In some cases, it could even be the difference between you needing to be medicated or being drug-free.
But the surprises didn’t end there.
When the researchers compared folks with the healthiest mouths to those who had gum disease AND weren’t under treatment for their hypertension, there was an even bigger average gap of 7 mmHg.
Link between inflammation and hypertension
In other words, no matter whether you’re already taking a med for your high blood pressure or not your oral health could be a BIG factor in your results.
And as baffling as a link between your gum disease and blood pressure may seem, there’s actually a very good reason for it.
As I’ve explained before, there’s a connection between chronic inflammation and blood flow. Over time low-grade inflammation, as you have with gum disease, can cause damage to your blood vessels.
And those vascular changes can affect your blood flow increasing your blood pressure.
Reducing high blood pressure starts in your mouth
The solution is simple. Step up your dental routine to reduce your risk of gun disease.
- Drop the soda and fruit juices and slash added sugars from your diet
- Brush regularly with a soft toothbrush and fluoride-free toothpaste
- See a holistic dentist regularly
Other drug-free solutions to nudge your blood pressure in the right direction include…
Drink more black tea: According to a study published in the journal Archives of Internal Medicine, three cups a day of black tea could significantly reduce blood pressure and heart disease risk. After six months volunteer who merely added black tea to their routines had their systolic and diastolic blood pressure drop by 10 percent on average.
Eat more walnuts: Try replacing one of your regular snacks with a small handful of walnuts. In a study, folks who did this had their blood pressure drop by three points on average.
Slash stress levels: Add some stress cutting measures such as meditation and exercise to your routine. Stress sends your cortisol levels climbing. And recent research has revealed certain gut bugs can convert cortisol into other hormones typically produced in our adrenal glands. And this process, in turn, can block your kidneys from purging excess sodium driving your blood pressure up.
When it comes to controlling your blood pressure, resorting to more risky meds isn’t the answer. Try taking care of your teeth to reduce you risk of gum disease and these other BP solutions instead.
She is an advocate of self-education and is passionate about the power of group knowledge sharing, like the kind found right here on HealthierTalk.com. Alice loves to share her views on holistic and natural healing as well as her, sometimes contentious, thoughts on the profit-driven inner workings of traditional medicine.
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