Lifestyle Guidelines for Hypertension Patients: How Daily Habits Affect Blood Pressure and Blood Lipids

Avoid excessive rinsing of rice: Rice is our staple food, rich in protein, carbohydrates, inorganic salts, and nutrients such as vitamin B₁, vitamin B2, and niacin. Rubbing rice with your hands during washing can cause nutrient loss, and the finer the rice, the more times it is rinsed, the longer it is soaked, and the higher the water temperature, the greater the nutrient loss. The various nutrients lost during rice rinsing are: thiamine 29%–60%, riboflavin and niacin 23%–25%, inorganic salts 70%, protein 15.7%, and fat 42.6%.

To avoid excessive nutrient loss during rice rinsing, we would like to offer the following tips:

(1) Do not soak rice for a long time after rinsing. If soaking has already occurred, cook the rice and the soaking water together.

(2) Rinse with water, generally twice, until the dirt and sand are removed.

(3) Do not rub the rice with your hands.

(4) Pick out any dirt, sand, yellow grains, and other impurities from the rice. (5) If the rice is contaminated with mold, pick out the moldy and yellowed grains and wash them thoroughly by hand several times. However, it is best to pay close attention when buying rice.

Avoid heavy smoking: It is a well-known fact that smoking is harmful to health. Statistics show that currently, more than half of the adult males and a quarter of the adult females worldwide smoke, and this number is increasing, making it a major concern for society.

Domestic and international medical experts agree that smoking poses a fatal threat to cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases. Analysis shows that the smoke from one cigarette contains 40 mg of tar, 3 mg of nicotine, and 30 mg of carbon monoxide (CO). These vasoactive substances, besides directly stimulating the vasomotor center and increasing blood pressure by stimulating the release of adrenaline and noradrenaline, can also directly damage the vascular endothelium. Combined with nicotine's effects of increasing total cholesterol (TC) and decreasing high-density lipoprotein (HDL), smokers are more prone to hyperlipidemia and atherosclerosis, thus significantly increasing the incidence of coronary heart disease. Nicotine in cigarettes can also directly stimulate blood vessels, causing spasms, increasing platelet aggregation, and simultaneously raising blood pressure and heart rate, thereby inducing coronary heart disease, angina pectoris, and myocardial infarction. Numerous facts have proven this.

Carbon monoxide inhaled from cigarette smoke quickly enters the bloodstream and easily combines with hemoglobin to form carboxyhemoglobin, rendering hemoglobin unable to carry oxygen. If the concentration of carboxyhemoglobin in the blood is too high, the blood oxygen concentration will significantly decrease, leading to insufficient tissue oxygen supply, arterial wall edema, intimal damage, and easier lipid penetration into the blood vessel wall, thus promoting the formation of atherosclerosis. Smoking lowers serum high-density lipoprotein (HDL) levels, while the ratio of serum triglycerides and cholesterol to HDL is higher in smokers than in non-smokers. Smoking increases the risk of coronary atherosclerosis.

Therefore, smoking poses a significant threat to cardiovascular health. To prevent and treat hyperlipidemia, atherosclerosis, and coronary heart disease, smokers are urged to quit. The earlier one quits, the better the prevention of coronary heart disease.