It’s interesting: the more I talk to patients about making lifestyle changes, the more I’ve thought about the same things in my own life and made some changes. I’ve started being much more aware of the sodium content of foods, too- something that I don’t need to be as concerned about for myself as our hypertensive patients do, but which is concerning on a meta level, because what is inexpensive and convenient is what people are eating.
We have in our community a sort of discount chain of food stores and I shopped there twice recently, reading labels. I found that the cans of non-condensed soup have considerably more sodium content than the cans at the, I guess you would say mainstream supermarket (not discount, not high-end). Eating consciously takes more effort on a restricted budget, it would seem. As always, awareness is key: I did find some heat-and-serve organic tomato soup there for a very reasonable price which has lower sodium; but even still, each serving contains 600 mg- 25% of the US RDA- and since the can contains two servings- a person (for example, me) is likely to eat both while on break at work. Of course, if my other meals are low in sodium, then this is not a problem. In fact, I know that I will be thirsty after a high-sodium meal, which is something of a disincentive as well.
This is something I was never concerned with before; but having heard myself give my own low-sodium instructions so many times, I have internalized it: yet more proof that this kind of thing works.
Tags: change, food, high blood pressure, hypertension, sodium
