Can Supplements Affect Blood Pressure?

Yes, supplements can affect blood pressure … and so can diet, lifestyle and other facets that make up everything we do. Here is how blood pressure works.

Blood pressure is regulated by a negative feedback system. In fact, two negative feedback systems come to mind immediately: blood pressure and the thyroid hormone system.

Blood pressure is naturally regulated by nerve endings in your arterial walls that sense when the pressure goes up or down. When they sense a change, they send electrical messages to your brain alerting it to the change in pressure. Your brain, in turn, sends electrical messages to the cells that make up your muscles to either relax to bring down the pressure, or tighten to increase the pressure.

Your brain also sends messages to your heart to slow down or speed up, whichever is necessary to maintain proper blood pressure levels.

What Can Affect Blood Pressure?

The electrical communication that needs to occur in the cardiovascular system and the nervous system is dependent on electrolytes to relay messages throughout these systems. Minerals in your diet (including supplements) and the minerals that are naturally present in your body (in your bones, for example) are the electrolytes that power this system so that electrical communication can occur.

Stress also affects the body’s minerals and the B vitamins. The more stress you experience, the more you need vitamins, minerals and relaxation.

Tips to Support Healthy Blood Pressure

• Stay active! Exercise in some way every day. Moving and being active can help with relaxation because rest is the natural state the body goes into after activity.
• Eat a diet rich in organically grown fruits, vegetables, grains and free range animals and poultry.
• Drink plenty of clean water. Distilled water is preferable because you don’t know where regular drinking water has been, and filtration may not remove everything you don’t want. Dehydration is not good for any bodily system, including the cardiovascular system.

How do you deal with the stress in your life?