Diets for Reducing High Blood Pressure

Video Transcript

"My name is Christine Marquette, and I'm a registered and licensed dietitian with Marquette Nutrition and Fitness. And I'm going to talk to you about diets for reducing high blood pressure. The very most popular diet for reducing blood pressure is the DASH diet. That actually stands for Dietary Actions to Stop Hypertension. Now this is actually evolved over the years. The standard DASH diet limits your sodium to about 2400 milligrams in a day. The more strict DASH diet that has evolved over the years, is limiting your sodium intake to 1500 milligrams per day. The premises behind both of them is that limiting your sodium and increasing things such as potassium and fruits and vegetables, increasing fiber, decreasing saturated fat, all of those things help with lowering your blood pressure. So, in general with the DASH diet, what's generally recommended is a very high intake of fruits and vegetables, usually around a minimum of eight servings of fruits and vegetables in a day. It also recommends whole grain products, usually in the amount of six to eight servings of whole grain products. This would be things like whole wheat bread, bran cereal or wheat cereal. Something like a pita that has a lot of fiber to it because it's made with wheat. It also involves the intake of beans, nuts and seeds. Those are all very high fiber items that contain protein as well. Plant based protein as well. So it does recommend that you also have beans, nuts or seeds several times each week. As far as your fat intake, it is highly recommended that you eliminate trans fats, and reduce your saturated fat intake. Your total fat intake should be around 30% of your calories, but most of that, about two-thirds of that should come from unsaturated fats. So, mono-unsaturated fats such as fats in avocados and olives and olive oil are highly promoted. Where as the saturated fats in things like dairy products are discouraged. If you use dairy product, it's encouraged to use low fat dairy, and it is recommended to have two or three servings of a low fat dairy product such as milk or yogurt on a daily basis. As far as animal protein, if it's coming from meat such as chicken, beef, pork, it's recommended that you limit it to no more than six ounces in a day. And with red meat, it is discouraged from having red meat on a daily basis. It's encouraged to limit it to just a couple of times a week. Primarily use leaner sources of meat such as fish and poultry. So that is the primary diet lowering high blood pressure."