Lower Your Blood Pressure with This Simple Tea Recipe

Hypertension is a major public health problem. The American Heart Association estimates high blood pressure affects approximately one in three adults in the United States, or about 76.4 million people.

Complications of high blood pressure include heart disease, kidney disease, hardening of the arteries, eye damage, and stroke (brain damage).

Lower Your Blood Pressure with This Simple Tea Recipe
Drinking hibiscus tea can significantly lower blood pressure, particularly when it is slightly elevated, according to a 2010 study in the Journal of Nutrition.

Diane L. McKay, Ph.D., lead author of the study, believes that anthocyanins and other antioxidants in hibiscus tea may work together to keep blood vessels resistant to damage that causes them to narrow.

McKay conducted a study on 65 people between the ages of 30 and 70 who had been diagnosed with prehypertension or mild hypertension.

After receiving hibiscus tea daily for six weeks, participants experienced reduced diastolic, systolic, and mean arterial pressures when compared with those who received a placebo. The effects were most pronounced in those with the highest beginning baseline blood pressures.

Hibiscus Tea Recipe
Recipe by: Tieraona Low Dog, MD, author of Life Is Your Best Medicine.

Ingredients:

4 cups water
3 tablespoons dried or 4-5 tablespoon fresh hibiscus flowers
1 cinnamon stick
1 tablespoon raw sugar (optional)
Juice of 1 orange (optional)
Preparation: Bring the water to a boil. Pour it over the hibiscus and the cinnamon stick. Steep the ingredients for 20 minutes. Strain the hibiscus and cinnamon stick out. Add sugar and orange juice (optional).

Hibiscus is safe and, unlike most blood pressure drugs, rarely causes side effects. Plus, hibiscus plants can be grown in much of the United States, so you can actually grow your own blood pressure medicine.

Note: Check with your doctor prior to taking hibiscus if you’re currently on medication to lower blood pressure — often a combination of an herb and a lower dose of a pharmaceutical provides the same benefit.