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It is often greatest to get calcium, magnesium, and potassium from meals. Are you getting sufficient? – “magnesium and blood pressure”
A wholesome, balanced food regimen performs a serious position in blood stress management. And it is best to eat some particular minerals frequently for good blood stress administration: calcium, magnesium, and potassium. However do most of us get sufficient of those? “If you’re eating a healthy diet, you probably have nothing to worry about. But people eating a diet of processed and canned foods or taking certain medications might not be getting enough of these micronutrients,” says Dr. Randall Zusman, director of the Division of Hypertension on the Massachusetts Normal Hospital Coronary heart Middle.
Potassium
Regular physique ranges of potassium are essential for muscle operate, together with enjoyable the partitions of the blood vessels. This lowers blood stress and protects towards muscle cramping. Regular potassium ranges are also essential for the conduction {of electrical} alerts within the nervous system and within the coronary heart. This protects towards an irregular heartbeat.
Potassium is discovered naturally in lots of meals, akin to prunes, apricots, candy potatoes, and lima beans. However meals might not be sufficient to maintain up your potassium ranges if you happen to take a diuretic for hypertension akin to hydrochlorothiazide (Esidrix, HydroDiuril). These medicine trigger potassium to go away your physique within the urine, thereby decreasing your physique’s potassium ranges. “I’d say at least a third of patients on diuretics for heart failure or high blood pressure or edema don’t get enough potassium from their diets. In those cases, we do use supplements,” says Dr. Zusman. Do not strive a complement by yourself. An excessive amount of potassium, like too little, can result in harmful irregular coronary heart rhythms.
The Advisable Dietary Allowance (RDA) of potassium is 4.7 grams per day for each women and men ages 51 and older.
Magnesium
Magnesium helps regulate a whole lot of physique programs, together with blood stress, blood sugar, and muscle and nerve operate. We’d like magnesium to assist blood vessels loosen up, and for power manufacturing, and bone growth. Similar to potassium, an excessive amount of magnesium may be misplaced in urine because of diuretic use, resulting in low magnesium ranges.
The Nationwide Institutes of Well being (NIH) stories that almost all older adults within the U.S. do not get the right quantity of magnesium of their diets, though excessive magnesium deficiency could be very uncommon. It is best to get the mineral from meals, particularly darkish, leafy inexperienced greens, unrefined grains, and legumes. The RDA of magnesium is 420 milligrams (mg) per day for males ages 50 and older; 320 mg/day for girls ages 50 and older.
An excessive amount of magnesium from a complement or from magnesium-containing medicine akin to laxatives might trigger diarrhea. There are not any recognized hostile results of magnesium consumption from meals.
Calcium
Calcium is essential for wholesome blood stress as a result of it helps blood vessels tighten and loosen up when they should. It is also essential for wholesome bones and the discharge of hormones and enzymes we’d like for many physique capabilities. We eat it naturally in dairy merchandise, fish (akin to canned salmon and sardines), and darkish, leafy greens.
The RDA of calcium for males ages 51 and older is between 1,000 and 1,200 mg per day. For girls ages 51 and older it is 1,200 mg per day. Nonetheless, many specialists imagine that these ranges are set too excessive and a few research counsel an affiliation between calcium dietary supplements and better threat of coronary heart illness.
“It’s been controversial, so most of us advise our patients to get their calcium from food rather than from supplement pills,” says Dr. Zusman. If it isn’t attainable to get sufficient calcium from meals, speak along with your physician if you happen to assume you might want a calcium complement.
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