High Blood Pressure – Can Slow Breathing Lower Your Blood Pressure?

High blood pressure, also called hypertension, is a problem that affects a lot of people. Since hypertension seldom causes any symptoms in the beginning, many are unaware of that they even have a problem. But if nothing is done, the risk of serious health problems later in life increases dramatically.

The standard response to hypertension is medication. But for a lot of people, medication is not a good long term solution. Just relying on drugs, without changing your life style often means that your blood pressure starts rising again after some time. You get stronger medication which helps for a while but soon you are faced with an increasing blood pressure again.

For most people, trying natural remedies is a much better long term solution than medication. The most common methods are healthier food habits, more physical activity and relaxation exercises. But lately, a new way of lowering your blood pressure has become popular, slow breathing.

Research has shown that a daily 15 minute session with eight breaths per minute is an efficient way of lowering your blood pressure. Some people have got good results with less than ten breaths per minute as well. That said, you should not focus on counting your breaths, just try to breathe slowly and smoothly. For many it may take a couple of sessions to just get down to ten breaths per minute. But it is more important to keep the breathing natural, rather than trying to force the number of breaths down.

Although slow breathing has in many cases proved to be an efficient way of lowering your blood pressure, it is not a panacea. If your hypertension is caused by your life style, for example unhealthy food habits and no exercise, your best bet is to change your life style. The old rule applies; fix the cause, not the symptom.

Even though slow breathing is easy to do, it is still possible to make it wrong and not getting any positive result. Make sure that you breathe gently, trying to fill your lungs completely with air may lead to hyperventilation. This will instead raise your blood pressure. Also if you start to feel light-headed, you need to stop the exercise.