High blood pressure, commonly known as hypertension, can lead to major cardiac problems, so it must be controlled. A meta-analysis found that drinking five to six cups of green tea per day can have a significant impact on your high blood pressure readings.

High blood pressure indicates that the force of blood flowing through your arteries is consistently too strong. When this occurs, your heart needs to work harder to circulate blood throughout your body. This can increase your risk of suffering a heart attack over time.

Fortunately, you can change your diet to reverse this mechanism before it’s too late.

Simple dietary changes can help lower a high blood pressure level.

The key finding of a meta-analysis performed by the Centre for Evidence-Based Medicine (CEBM), which is part of Oxford University’s Nuffield Department of Primary Care Health Sciences, is that green tea boosts blood pressure-lowering capabilities.

“Many different dietary supplements are marketed, but the evidence for effectiveness is mixed,” the researchers wrote.

However, “green tea extracts are thought to possess antioxidant and ACE-inhibitor properties”, they noted.

To investigate the effect of green tea consumption on blood pressure, they appraised and synthesised the evidence from clinical trials evaluating the effect of green tea on blood pressure.

The researchers searched five electronic databases and included only double-blinded randomised clinical trials (RCTs).

They also assessed the reporting quality of included studies.

Thirty-eight eligible studies were identified, out of which we included 20 RCTs with over 1,500 participants.

“Meta-analysis showed that green tea consumption caused a significant reduction in systolic blood pressure and total and LDL cholesterol,” the researchers observed.

LDL cholesterol is also a precursor to cardiovascular problems.

“We also observed that the maximum effects of green tea occurred when the daily intake of epigalocatechin-3-gallate (the most abundant and bioactive compound in green tea extracts) was approximately 200 mg which equates to five to six cups of tea daily,” they concluded.

“Above this dosage, adverse events appeared to be more frequent and more severe.”