Dash Eating Plan

Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension (DASH) eating plan is a lifelong approach to healthy eating that's designed to help treat or prevent high blood pressure or hypertension (the medical term). DASH was developed in the research sponsored by the US National Institutes of Health and showed that it could lower blood pressure without medication. The DASH diet research also showed that what we choose to eat affects our chances of developing high blood pressure.

Recent studies show that blood pressure can be lowered by following the Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension (DASH) eating plan—and by eating less salt, also called sodium. While each step alone lowers blood pressure, the combination of the eating plan and a reduced sodium intake gives the biggest benefit and may help prevent the development of high blood pressure. Since then, numerous studies have shown that the DASH diet reduces the risk of many other diseases, including stroke, heart disease, heart failure, kidney stones, diabetes and some kinds of cancer.