Weight Training Can Lower Blood Pressure

Anahad O’Connor, the New York Times health answer person, reminds us that, for years, doctors have been advising patients with hypertension to steer clear of weight training, an the assumption that the strenuous activity would cause blood pressure to spike. Unfortunately, says Anahad, that assumption was not based on medical evidence, and the studies that were done failed to find a connection between pumping up and pumped up blood pressure. Now, says O’Connor, new studies are suggesting that the opposite is true.
A recent analysis in the journal Hypertension examined 11 clinical trials comparing 182 adults who lifted weights several times a week and 138 who did not. Over all, the Times reports, it found that weight training lowered resting systolic blood pressure by 2 percent, and diastolic pressure by about 4 percent. Another report by the American Heart Association, published in the journal Circulation, found that just two or three bouts of weight training a week — with exercises like curls and presses — were enough to lower blood pressure.
Read more in the New York Times.