Diagnosed With Hypertension? Here Are Five Quick and Easy Guidelines To Follow When Exercising

Tip #1: Get Your Blood Pressure Checked – First of all, you want to check your blood pressure before and after exercise. You need to know what you’re working with and ensure you’re not pushing your blood pressure into a dangerously high zone. This applies especially if you have been diagnosed with hypertension by your doctor.

Tip #2: Low Intensity Exercises Only – Again, to avoid pushing your blood pressure into a dangerously high zone, avoid high-intensity exercises. Instead, focus on low intensity exercises with low resistance and higher repetition (more endurance-based). Here’s a general rule: the intensity should be between 30 and 60 percent of your maximum heart rate if you’re doing any type of strength training or cardiovascular activity (As always, please email me if you have questions on what’s right for YOU – I love hearing from you). The very best way to determine your optimum heart rate during exercise would be to get tested by a physical therapist.

Tip #3: Low Reps – If you’re doing strength exercises, your repetitions should NOT exceed ten to twelve repetitions per set. This is generally enough to build muscle safely while at the same time protecting yourself from pushing your blood pressure too high.

Tip #4: More Rest Time – Spend more rest time between sets when exercising. You should allow at a bare minimum of least 15 — 30 seconds between sets. Even better would be two minutes or so between sets when lifting weights or doing strength exercises.

Tip #5: Limit Your Session Time To Reasonable Amounts – You don’t have to be in the gym forever to get good results! I would suggest you limit the total number of exercises in one session to no more than ten or twelve. That means exercise every body part, but limit the number of exercises to a maximum of 10 or 12 for your entire body.

It’s a balancing act when you have hypertension. You have to balance both the need for exercise with the natural effect of elevating your blood pressure during exercise. However, don’t let this scare you away from physical activity: you’re much better off exercising than staying sedentary. Remember: a sedentary lifestyle is one of the risk factors associated with hypertension! And with time, as you get in better shape and lose weight, your blood pressure will be under control.