Believe it or not, there are foods that can help lower your blood pressure. While you should continue to take any medications that have been prescribed by your physician for your hypertension, and consult with him before adding anything to your diet, with proper supervision, natural blood pressure lowering foods can often be added to your diet as well.

What's a good example of a food that can help lower your blood pressure?

How about garlic? Yes, it's true. Garlic supplements have been shown to help lower your blood pressure by as much as 5-10%. A dose of 900 mg of garlic powder per day can help lower your cholesterol, reduce your triglyceride levels, and promote healthy blood circulation. However, since garlic does have blood thinning properties, it should never be combined with prescription blood thinners (Coumadin or Trental for example) or natural substances that also thin your blood such as vitamin E or ginkgo.

Fruits and vegetables can also help control your hypertension. These include oranges, greens, potatoes, beans, okra, cabbage etc. Some fruits will supply your body with additional vitamin C, which is also useful in assisting with lowering your blood pressure.

Since, cholesterol can have an unfavorable impact on your blood pressure, especially when your cholesterol levels are high, switching from regular dairy foods to low fat dairy foods is a priority. Low fat yogurt, cheese without fat or with less fat, low calories cheese, cottage cheese with fat levels of just one per cent … these are examples of dairy products that can help give you an advantage over your high blood pressure. You can still enjoy the dairy products, still enjoy the flavors and textures, just check the labels first to limit as much fat as possible.

Along these same lines, keep an eye on the fat content of any meats you consume. Whenever possible, chose meats with less fat. For example, the white meat that comprises chicken or turkey (without the skin) should be considered as one of the foods that help to control your hypertension. Similarly, egg whites instead of whole eggs are preferrable since the yolk of the egg is thought to contain high levels of cholesterol.

What else can you do?

Excessive consumption of alcohol, especially on a daily basis, can raise your blood pressure. So keep in mind that alcohol should always be taken in moderate amounts especially if you're in a hypertensive state.

The good foods on your list can lose their effectiveness if they contain high levels of sodium. Since it's well known to increase blood pressure, your sodium intake should always be carefully monitored.

Omega-3 fatty acids are considered a healthy addition to your diet.

Summing it all up.

Anyone can develop high blood pressure. African Americans are at higher risk for this serious disease than any other race or ethnic group. High blood pressure tends to be more common, happens at an earlier age, and is more severe for many African Americans. The good news is that hypertension can be controlled. Better yet, it can be prevented.

Eating a healthy diet, comprised of the right foods, can have huge benefits if you're dealing with high blood pressure. In fact, a healthy diet can often be the deciding factor of whether you'll need to take hypertensive drugs or not.