Do doctor’s visits make you nervous? Does your blood pressure skyrocket every time a medical professional gets near you with a stethoscope? You’re not alone. Your condition even has a name: “White Coat Syndrome” and it can be a real problem. Read on for a few things you can do to reduce your stress and keep your blood pressure from spiking during medical appointments.

You may be a bit puzzled as to why this is happening. It’s actually quite easy. You’re stressed about what your doctor might find. After all, if they are checking your blood pressure, they’re concerned that it might be too high. And your blood pressure rushes to oblige.

Seriously, if you’re stressed, your blood pressure goes up. That’s just part of the fight or flight response that we’ve been conditioned for by evolution. Way back, this response was helpful. It helped our ancestors muster all the resources they had available so they could escape their dangerous predators or fight them successfully — and live to procreate. Clearly, it was a successful mechanism, or we wouldn’t be here.

Today, however, such a response is much less helpful. In fact, it can mean major trouble. If your medical team believes that have hypertension when you really don’t, you may end up with prescription medications that are not appropriate for you — and that could even be dangerous as such medication could result in lowering your pressure below the level where it should be.

Besides, most prescription medications designed to lower people’s blood pressure have serious side effects that can cause all sorts of problems of their own. Basically, it’s a good idea to avoid them if at all possible. And that doesn’t even take into account the enormous price tag of many of those drugs.

So what can you do to keep your “White Coat Syndrome” in check during medical exams?

One of the most useful things you can do (short of losing a lot of weight so this becomes a non-issue) is to learn some stress management techniques that can help you chill under pressure. Here are a few to get you started:

1) Breathe

Slow and rhythmic breathing will help calm you down and lower your blood pressure.

2) Aromatherapy

Use some soothing aromatherapy to help you stay calm. Lavender works very well, or use a combination product.

3) Do a gratitude exercise

Make up a list of all the things you’re grateful for. Add to that list every day and read it daily too. And make sure you refer back to it as you wait for the doctor to show up.

4) Use EFT (Emotional Freedom Technique)

One of the most powerful techniques you could use is EFT (also known as Emotional Freedom Technique). It’s a kind of needle-less acupuncture where you tap certain parts of your body while making a series of statements.

EFT has been proven to work especially well for reducing stress. You may find that it will lower your stress considerably and make your “White Coat Syndrome” a thing of the past.

Author Bio: Ready to give EFT a try? You’re invited to get Elisabeth Kuhn Ph.D.’s FREE Easy EFT manual (with illustration to show the tapping points) and start tapping. You may soon find that doctor’s visits are much less stressful than they used to be. To download the manual, just CLICK HERE!

Category: Wellness, Fitness and Diet
Keywords: white coat syndrome,hypertension remedies,high blood pressure remedies,lower your blood pressure,