Show your heart some love during National Heart Month.

The shops are full of heart shaped cards and decorations and we all know that Valentines Day is on it’s way, but did you know that this month is also National Heart Month?

According to the British Heart foundation, high blood pressure is just one of the risk factors for developing heart and circulatory disease, along with high cholesterol, diabetes and other lifestyle factors.

As many as 5 million people in the UK are walking around, undiagnosed, with high blood pressure. The only way to know whether you have high blood pressure is to have it measured. Everyone should know their blood pressure. The British Heart foundation recommends that everyone over 40 gets their blood pressure taken by a nurse or doctor as part of a health check to assess their risk for getting heart and circulatory disease.

Should you find that you do have a high blood pressure, don’t panic, there are not only medications to keep it under control, but easy lifestyle changes will make a big difference.

Making sure that you are physically active and maintain a healthy diet will help you to control your blood pressure. Making sure that you get enough sleep and stay in control of your stress levels can also help.

Many of the people who end up hospitalised as a result of more serious medical conditions caused by high blood pressure, were not even aware that they had a problem until it was too late.

Being aware of your blood pressure is extremely important, especially if you are over 65, have a family history or are overweight- it could even save your life!

There are plenty of perfectly functional and reasonably priced monitors available to buy in chemist and many doctors’ surgeries offer a free blood pressure monitoring service. Ask your GP for more information.

However if you want a state of the art monitor and wish to track your blood pressure at the touch of a button then you need to look no further than this blood pressure monitor that is compatible with your ipad, ipod or iphone. Based on the iOS operating system and Bluetooth technology, you can test, track and share your blood pressure results wirelessly with your iPod touch: iPhone and iPad. The monitor is integrated on the arm cuff and works with the Free App. It can even work out averages to see if the chances that you have made to your lifestyle or any medication that you are on is having a positive effect. This information can then be sent to family members or caregivers at the tough of a button.