Exercise Therapy for Hypertensive Patients

Hypertensive patients tend to experience cardiac diseases such as myocardial infarction more frequently than the normotensive subjects. Exercise training in hypertensive patients alliviates their symptoms, improves their cardiopulmonary endurance, and decreases their cholesterol levels. Regular exercise in hypertensive patients decreases the development of their symptoms, therefore makes patients comfortable due to the decreased sympathetic tones and increased parasympathetic tones. To prescribe exercise to hypertensive patients, it is essential to evaluate the patients' blood pressure while exercising. The components of exercise prescription include the mode, intensity, duration, and frequency of exercise, The best exercise for hypertensive patients is aerobic exercise which improves cardiopulmonary functions. It makes the patients take less medications. The aerobic exercise includes cycling, walking, and running. The intensity of the aerobic exercise should be 45~60% of their VO2max value. While the patient is taking medication, the prescription of exercise should be cautious, because most antihypertensive agents decrease exercise endurance, and thus make it difficult to continue exercise, compared with those without medication.