Vitamin C is a water-soluble vitamin with powerful antioxidant properties. It prevents infections, helps build immunity, and keeps you healthy. You must ensure that you consume enough of it daily in the form of fruits and vegetables. You can get it through fruits like oranges, kiwis, strawberries, and vegetables like lemons, spinach, broccoli, kale, and bell peppers.
Vitamin C shows many benefits to your body like:
- Boosts your immunity
- Imparts glow to your skin
- Lowers the risk of cancers
- Lowers the exacerbation of gout
- Protects you from infections
- Reduces inflammation
- Keeps blood pressure under control
- Lowers elevated levels of serum uric acid
- Slows down aging
- Keeps your bones, cartilages, and teeth strong
Along with the above-mentioned benefits, it protects your heart by lowering the risk of heart diseases. There are many factors involved in causing heart diseases like blood pressure and blood cholesterol levels. According to experts, taking up to 400 to 700 mg of vitamin C per day can lower the risk of heart diseases.
Vitamin C deficiency can cause scurvy- a condition in which bleeding of gum occurs with fatigue, rashes, and bruising. Therefore you must make sure that you get enough of it. For women, the daily recommended dose is 75mg and for men, it is 90mg. If you fail to get enough of it through natural resources, you can get it through a supplement.
Vitamin C and your heart
Hyperlipidemia is a condition in which the levels of bad cholesterol rise in your blood that can lead to clogging of arteries forming a thrombus. Due to which blood supply to any organ can get disrupted. When it occurs in the blood vessels of the heart, it causes a heart attack or myocardial infarction. Due to thrombus for formation, oxygen, and nutrient supply to the heart tissues is disturbed.
Moreover, high blood pressure can lead to blockage of arteries or cause them to burst due to excessive pressure, leading to a heart attack eventually. High blood pressure, also known as hypertension, is a cardiac disease in which the blood pressure remains elevated as compared to normal readings. Vitamin C can help in keeping it under control. According to experts, vitamin C helps in the dilation of blood vessels that carry blood from the heart to the whole body, eventually lowering the blood pressure. Moreover, when taken in high amounts like 500mg daily, it may also act as a diuretic. Due to this, excess fluid is excreted out that your body has retained, which causes high blood pressure.
However, the antihypertensive effects of vitamin C are light. If you are hypertensive, do not stop taking your medicine or do not substitute it with any other supplement or medicine, unless your healthcare provider advises it.
Taking too much vitamin C
Apart from all the benefits that vitamin C has for your body, you must consume it in an adequate quantity. Consuming the right amount of vitamin C has amazing benefits for your body. But if you take too much of it, it may result in adverse effects like gastrointestinal cramps, nausea, vomiting, and diarrhea. Also, consuming too much vitamin C can result in too much absorption of iron, which can, in turn, cause hemochromatosis, a condition in which iron deposits around the organs. It is a medical emergency.
Conclusion
Vitamin C helps in lowering the risk of heart diseases. But along with it, you need to practice a healthy lifestyle that includes daily exercise and healthy eating. Furthermore, vitamin C is not a substitute for the medicines prescribed by your doctor for your heart. Do not stop taking those medicines on your own, or do not substitute them on your own. Vitamin C only helps in lowering the risk of heart diseases. But it cannot be taken as a symptomatic treatment for hypertension, thrombosis, or heart attack.
Along with supplementation, you must take it through natural resources. Incorporate at least 700mg of vitamin C daily in your diet to lower the risk of heart diseases.