Suffering from hypertension? Cardamom can help

Worried about your escalating blood pressure? Add some cardamom to your tea!

Poorva Chavan | Updated: March 15, 2016 11:08 am

Hypertension can easily be controlled with a few changes to your lifestyle and dietary habits. Apart from prescribing medicines for the condition, doctors suggest living a more active life, exercising more and eating right. After all, hypertension is a gateway to other heart diseases and makes you prone to atherosclerosis and heart attacks.

Dietary changes usually involve reducing your salt intake by cutting down junk food and sticking to home-cooked, low-salt meals. These changes not only help in lowering or controlling your blood pressure levels but they make you healthier by helping you lose a little bit of body weight.

Along with cutting down your salt intake, you can also include certain natural remedies that assist in reducing your blood pressure levels. One such natural remedy is cardamom.

It is a widely used condiment in the Indian kitchen and is known for its sweet taste and aroma. It is used to flavour sweets, to enhance the richness of certain curries and in different types of rice preparations, etc. But its benefits are not just limited to its flavor. Apart from being an excellent digestive aid, it also helps in controlling blood pressure levels. It is rich in certain antioxidants that help in lowering the blood pressure. Cardamom is especially effective if you suffer from stage 1 hypertension. A study published in the Indian Journal of Biochemistry and Biophysics says that cardamom can help in reducing systolic, diastolic and mean blood pressure levels.

How to use cardamom?

While you might add cardamom to flavor sweets, it is important to remember that hypertension also involves avoiding sugar-rich and high cholesterol foods.

So the simplest way to include cardamom in your diet regularly is to add a pinch a cardamom powder to your cup of tea. Alternatively, you can also chew a pod of cardamom after your meals, not only does it help you control hypertension, it is an excellent digestive and a mouth freshener too.

Reference

Verma SK, Jain V, Katewa SS. Blood pressure lowering, fibrinolysis enhancing and antioxidant activities of cardamom (Elettaria cardamomum). Indian J Biochem Biophys. 2009 Dec;46(6):503-6. PubMed PMID: 20361714.

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Published: March 14, 2016 6:05 pm | Updated:March 15, 2016 11:08 am

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