How to Naturally Lower Your Blood Pressure

Raena Morgan: Hi I'm Raena Morgan with iHealthTube visiting with Robert Kowalski. We've talked about natural weapons against blood pressure and one that I wanted to cover this morning would be Pycnogenol. That has an interesting history to it, doesn't it? Robert Kowalski: It's a marvelous little story. Raena Morgan: Right. Robert Kowalski: This one starts way back, when the pioneers were first coming to North America. And when Canada was first being settled along the coast a number of the sailors who had come over from Europe were suffering from scurvy. Scurvy is a condition that affects the gums and a number of other organs of the body and it's the results of a deficiency or total lack, in fact of vitamin C in the diet. Raena Morgan: Right. Robert Kowalski: Because those ship voyages were very long to get all the way across the Atlantic. Raena Morgan: No veggies or bioflavonoids. Robert Kowalski: No veggies, no fruits, none of that and no supplements to take either. So the Indians, actually, showed these new settlers how to make a tea out of the bark and pine needles of the tree that grew along the Canadian coast in what's called in maritime provinces, Nova Scotia, and New Brunswick and so forth. They weren't called that back then, I don't know what the Indians referred to it as. Raena Morgan: Right, it was up around Hudson Bay, right. Okay. Robert Kowalski: Right, exactly. And lo and behold, this tea cured the scurvy; showing that it had a strong antioxidant effects in the same way that vitamin C does. In fact, upon analysis, you find that it is indeed a very rich source of vitamin C, understanding that they didn't trade with Indians from California to get or Florida to get oranges, the Indians up in Canada. You find different, similar items of nutritional benefit in many different kinds of food. Vitamin C for example, in Mexico they get it from their hot chili peppers. Raena Morgan: Okay. Robert Kowalski: And the Spaniards introduced the oranges, and so it goes. So we learn these things over a period of time. Now, flash forward, and the discovery was noted that this Pycnogenol was also derived from the pine bark in the trees growing along the coast in France. In fact, it was the Canadian explorers who first worked with the Indians to make the tea. And so, now, all the way up into the present, studies have been done to see why it is that you have a blood pressure lowering effect from Pycnogenol. Raena Morgan: Is it the vitamin C? Robert Kowalski: No. Raena Morgan: Isn't that interesting. Robert Kowalski: It turns out that, that it is, it is a particular kind of polyphenolic a flavonoid as they call it, flavonol rather and there have been a number of studies done. One that I particularly like was they, they took a group of people who had already been on a prescription drug that has the effect of blocking calcium. It's called a calcium channel blocker. Raena Morgan: Okay. Robert Kowalski: A typical kind of antihypertensive drug. Well, they needed more of a boost. They're blood pressure wasn't low enough to make the doctors happy to bring them out of risk. So they gave some of the people an increased dose in the drug called Nifedipine and others received a does of the Pycnogenol pine bark extract. Raena Morgan: Alright. Robert Kowalski: Equal results, was just as effective to use the Pycnogenol as it was to double the dose of this prescription drug, Nifedipine. Raena Morgan: And there's no side effect. Robert Kowalski: No side effects whatsoever. Raena Morgan: From the Pycnogenol. Robert Kowalski: A second study was done with people who had, what is actually that I've talked before about the idea of pre-hypertension, the numbers between 120/80, which is normal, we'd like to see it 120/80 or lower and actual hypertension which is 140/90 in that no man's land, you're still at increased risk. These people were even beyond that. They had blood pressures anywhere from the mid-130s all the way up into the 150s. In other words, they had actual hypertension, the kind that any doctor would; this is the approach that a typical physician will take. They will sit down and say, "Raena, we've tested you now a number of times, there's no question that we've got a definite situation here, where your blood pressure is elevated to a level that we would call hypertension. This places you at risk for heart attack and stroke and I want you to start taking this drug." Instead, we now have the alternative of the Pycnogenol because in that particular study, they found about a 17 point drop. Raena Morgan: That's excellent, 17 point drop. Robert Kowalski: That's astounding. So now, if let's say someone was at 147 to being with and they just took this one thing; this one capsule, totally free of side effects, a day, 17 point drop will bring them down to 130. Okay? That's one aspect of the program that I describe in The Blood Pressure cure. That particular agent, the Pycnogenol, works in 2 different ways. One is to increase the level of nitric oxide, which relaxes the artery. The second is to work on the kidney, which interestingly is the site which many of the prescription drugs work to lower blood pressure. So you get sort of a double whammy with it. Combine that with another substance that we find within the book, another one of my secret weapons against blood pressure, the sustained release arginine. This is an amino acid that the body uses to make the nitric oxide that relaxes the artery, making it more flexible, allowing for greater blood flow, and blood pressure comes down. So those are the building blocks of the nitric oxide and now we combine it with the Pycnogenol to in effect increase the production of nitric oxide from that arginine and you are in the completely normal range. Raena Morgan: Well, thank you for giving us that information.