Smoking Diseases Include Hypertension
True or False?

I would think that smoking diseases should include high blood pressure, but the experts disagree. Let's see if this makes sense.

Looking at my immediate family, my mother, two uncles, and two wives were all heavy smokers. None had high blood pressure. None were overweight.

All my aunts and grandparents had high blood pressure. They were non smokers! Except for one, they were all overweight.

Should you and I smoke to control blood pressure?

Let's see what a famous medical clinic says about smoking and high blood pressure.

I'm not agreeing here, but let's see what they say.

Smoking causes the following problems related to blood pressure:

1. Tobacco nicotine causes normal blood pressure to go high by narrowing the blood vessels, and puts more strain on the heart.

2. Smoking may cause damage to the linings of blood vessels, leading to inflammation of these arteries.

3. One of the smoking diseases is plaque build up, which causes an increase in blood pressure.

4. Carbon monoxide in cigarette smoke lessens the amount of oxygen in the blood, causing the heart to exert itself more to send oxygen to the cells of the body. This is one of the hypertension causes.

5. Those people who quit smoking will have lower blood pressure and will dramatically reduce their chances of heart disease within one year.

Pretty strong language, isn't it. It would seem to say that if you have normal blood pressure, smoking will raise it.

Not necessarily so - the high blood pressure statements above are not based on experimental evidence, but on what seems to be logical assumptions.

What is the case here?

Smoking and high blood pressure may be related, but another factor is in play that messes up the smoking diseases and hypertension causes we'd expect.

Recall what I wrote about my family: the smokers were skinny, the non smokers were fat.

It may be weight that's the dominant culprit.

So, it would be interesting to compare hypertension in smokers and non smokers of the same weight.

I have a feeling that weight control is the major factor whether we be smoker or non.

That's why I emphasize getting on a proper high blood pressure diet to maintain normal blood pressure.

Smoking diseases include cancer, emphysema, arteriosclerosis and various others, but apparently don't cover high blood pressure.

So, the recommendation that I want to give you is don't smoke and get on a good weight loss diet.

That plus all the information on this site should help you maintain your normal blood pressure.

Please help your self.

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