Blood Pressure

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5.       Unlike your home’s water heater valve to release steam, your blood circulatory system does not come equipped with a pressure release valve. As a result of faulty lifestyle and eating habits, thin-walled blood vessels in the brain can burst under extreme pressure, causing the wholesale slaughter of brain cells that is known as “haemorrhagic stroke”. High blood pressure damages smooth artery walls which creates anchor points for plaque to latch onto and build up in one of the brain’s or other artery, eventually cutting off blood flow. Kidney failure or heart attack can also follow from excessive plaque accumulation.

6.       Then there is the plain old wear and tear that hypertension causes on your ticker. Over time, the extra work brought on by high BP causes the walls to stiffen and thicken. With thick rigid walls, the heart becomes a less efficient pump, unable to push out as much blood as it takes in. Blood backs up, the heart gives out and the coroner scribbles “congestive heart failure” on your medical bedside chart!

Heart – The Most Efficient Pump

7.       Human heart, weighing about 340 grams, is the world’s most efficient pump, pumping blood through more than 90,000 kilometers of arteries, veins and capillaries (blood vessels). The power of the heart is less than a 100 watt bulb but has incredible efficiency of filling tanks of 300 cars per day; and that too without rest and break and year after year. No other muscle in the body is as hardworking and as strong as the heart is. Heart is only 0.5% of body weight but needs 5% of total blood supply to take care of its nutritional needs.

Blood Circulatory System

8.       Blood picks up oxygen in the lungs from the air that we breathe in. This oxygenated blood enters the heart and is then pumped out to all parts of the body in blood vessels called arteries. Larger blood vessels branch into smaller and smaller ones and then to microscopic arterioles, which eventually form tiny networks of blood vessels known as capillaries. This 90,000 kilometer network of larger arteries, medium-sized arterioles and tiny capillaries allows blood to reach every cell of the body and deposit its oxygen, which is used by the cells to make the vital energy they need to survive. Once the blood has deposited its oxygen in the cells, the deoxygenated blood returns to the heart, to be pumped back up to the lungs to pick up more oxygen.