Eating Healthy

You may already be following a healthy eating plan to help lower your blood pressure. A healthy eating plan includes a lot of fruits, vegetables, and whole grains. It is also important to limit salt, fat, and sugar in your diet.

Small changes can help

Always watching what you eat can be hard. It’s even harder if you enjoy eating out. Fortunately, there are small changes that you can make in your eating habits that can help make a difference with your blood pressure. These changes include:

• Eating less salt
• Following the DASH eating plan (see below)

Cutting back on salt

You may know that too much salt can raise your blood pressure—and that putting less salt on foods is a good idea. But did you know that most of the salt that people eat comes from the salt already in processed foods? So it’s important to read food labels on a wide range of foods. That way you can choose low-salt or no-salt foods.

Try to limit your sodium (salt) to 1500 milligrams (mg) a day. This amount has been shown to help lower blood pressure. The chart below can help you choose low-salt, heart-healthy foods.

Smart Choices to Reduce Salt
Instead of		Try this
	Salt		Pepper, allspice, curry powder, ginger, lemon juice, or other low-salt spices
	Canned vegetables		Fresh vegetables
	Chips or salted nuts		Unsalted nuts or seeds, fruit, and raw vegetables, or low-salt versions of your favorite chips
	Regular canned soups		Soups marked “low sodium”

Here are more tips for cutting back on salt:

• Limit cured foods (bacon) and those in brine (pickles, olives)
• Limit condiments like soy sauce and teriyaki sauce, even those with reduced sodium
• Sprinkle less salt on your food. This can help reduce your taste for salt over time

The DASH eating plan

DASH (Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension) is an eating plan that helps you make healthy food choices for lower blood pressure. Studies show that the DASH eating plan can help you lower your blood pressure and your LDL (or bad) cholesterol. Along with reducing salt, the DASH eating plan encourages you to:

• Choose fresh fruits and vegetables and foods that are low in saturated fat, cholesterol, and total fat
• Eat less lean red meat and fewer high fat foods
• Limit sweets and drinks that contain sugar

Recipes for the DASH eating plan

Would you like some recipes created for the DASH eating plan? You may want to enroll in the Right Fit Program. This FREE program for people taking AZOR provides healthy recipes and tips for making healthy food choices.

Notice and Healthcare Provider Certification

The following information is intended only for healthcare professionals licensed and practicing in the United States and is designed to be an educational aid that supplements and draws upon the professional training, experience, and knowledge of such healthcare professionals. If you are a patient or consumer, or are seeking the information for the benefit of a patient or consumer, please see the patient information section of our site, which has been specifically designed to provide information of interest to patients and consumers.

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