Everyone has blood pressure; it’s the way that blood is pushed through your body by the heart into all the tiny parts of your body. You can think of it like the pumping station of the body pushing fluids all through the body. Blood pressure is the pressure placed by the flowing blood on the carrying vessels as it moves through the body. As the blood moves away from the heart, the speed of the rushing blood stream decreases just as it would in water pipes. When the blood reaches the major vessels in the upper right or left arm, you can use that site to record the pressure of blood in that blood vessel. That is not the only location however to record blood pressure.

Blood pressure can be also measured at several sites in the body like the groin and the ankle. But the upper arms are the most convenient and offer an accurate reading. The Ankle Brachial Pressure Index (ABPI) is the ratio of the pressure recorded at the ankle and the pressure recorded at the upper arm also called as the brachial blood pressure.

Measuring Blood Pressure

Arterial blood pressure is recorded by a special machine called sphygmomanometer. This device uses a mercury column to reflect the pressure of blood inside the body. This is also called as the non-invasive method of measuring blood pressure. Invasive methods of recording blood pressure are also possible but this requires penetrating the body and planting a monitor inside the body. It requires a hospital setting to maintain asepsis. Blood pressure values are recorded in millimeters of mercury even though mechanical devices to measure blood pressure do not use mercury columns.

Blood pressure is recorded as systolic and diastolic pressure. Systolic pressure records the highest pressure in the arteries, when the heart starts to contract to push blood through the body. Diastolic pressure is the pressure in the arteries, when the cardiac cycle is coming to an end. This is almost similar to squeezing a rubber balloon. Squeezing the balloon is systolic pressure and relaxing your hand is called as diastolic pressure. Normal pressure in a healthy adult should be about 115 mmHg systolic and 75 mmHg diastolic and it’s written as 115/75 mmHg.

Systolic and diastolic pressure do not remain the same all through the day. Food, dieting, exercise, stress, tensions and a lot of other factors can affect systolic and diastolic pressure through out the day. But if the variations are huge and persist for long periods of time then the condition is referred to as high blood pressure or hypertension. There are chances that your pressure may fall for some reason too like low blood pressure happens most commonly when the person is dieting. The heart does not get sufficient oxygen and nutrients and thus it decreases its pumping rate leading to low blood pressure or hypotension.

Common signs of high blood pressure are dizziness, headaches, low libido and sexual desire, nausea and vomiting etc

Common signs of low blood pressure are the same but are mainly caused due to malnutrition and poor diet.

Blood Pressure Medicines:

• Generic Aceon
• Generic Adalat
• Generic Adalat Cc Er
• Generic Aldactone
• Generic Altace
• Generic Atacand
• Generic Atacand-hctz
• Generic Avalide
• Generic Avapro
• Generic Benicor
• Generic Benicor Hct
• Generic Bisoprolol
• Generic Caduet
• Generic Calan
• Generic Calan Sr
• Generic Cardura
• Generic Clorpres
• Generic Coumadin
• Generic Diovan
• Generic Esidrix
• Generic Hydrodiuril
• Generic Hytrin
• Generic Hyzaar
• Generic Isoptin Sr
• Generic Lasix
• Generic Lopid
• Generic Lozol
• Generic Micardis
• Generic Microzide
• Generic Minipress
• Generic Moduretic
• Generic Trandate
• Generic Vaseretic
• Generic Zestoretic