In this article we're going to discuss the main difficulty with controlling high blood pressure. It isn't what you think.

Of all the diseases and problems that we as people face, high blood pressure is one of the most easily treatable. Yet, there are so many people who have it and are unable to lower it. Why?

The answer may surprise you.

Most people who suffer from high blood pressure, have been diagnosed as having it and been given a treatment regime have great difficulty in sticking to the regime itself. That is the biggest problem in battling high blood pressure.

For example. Patients who need to take certain drugs to lower their blood pressure become lax. They may basically feel okay, especially if their blood pressure is not serious enough. Most people with borderline high blood pressure have no symptoms. Therefore, because they basically feel in good health they will occasionally skip their medications or not take them at all.

Then there are people who smoke. Smokers have probably the hardest time of all quitting or even reducing the amount they smoke each day. Just look around at all the stop smoking programs there are. This will give you a pretty good idea of how hard it is to quit. Also, since smoking itself does not directly raise your blood pressure this gives a person even less incentive to stop, adding to that the likelihood that stopping will end up putting weight on which will actually raise the blood pressure itself.

Alcohol is another problem. People who enjoy a couple of drinks a day are very unlikely to give them up, especially if they have stressful jobs. Those couple of drinks help relax them at least psychologically even if their blood pressure is being raised in the process. And for people who are alcoholics, stopping or even lowering their alcohol intake is almost impossible.

Salt in the diet is a very hard thing to give up. The truth is, with the depleted soil in our world, most foods have very little taste. People who live with a salt shaker in their hands would have a very difficult time eating their meals without that extra salt. For many people, eating is one of the great joys in their lives. To turn that into an unpleasant experience is not something they are likely to do. Plus, those who always on the go and have little choice but to eat in fast food chains are never going to be able to decrease their salt intake.

Then there is the matter of obesity. Just like with smoking, look at all the diet programs. Losing weight for many people is one of the hardest things in their life. Even if they want to, some people find it close to impossible. And for people who are overweight, exercising to lose those extra pounds may be difficult because obese people just don't have the stamina to do much exercise.

When you add all the above factors together and each ones degree of difficulty, it is easy to see why so many people have trouble reducing their blood pressure.

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Michael Russell
Your Independent guide to High Blood Pressure
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