Salt intake and hypertension.

The guidelines for hypertension treatment recommend a reduction of dietary sodium intake. There is still a controversy, few studies showing an inverse correlation between cardiovascular morbidity and salt intake, about the benefit expected from a reduction of sodium intake on the blood pressure level. This controversy is explained by the great variability of the pressure response when individuals are exposed to different sodium intakes, diet and environmental factors playing an additional role of variability. Salt sensitivity is more frequent in hypertensive, obese and in elderly patients. There is no harm to reduce salt overtake moreover normalisation of the dietary sodium intake has clearly demonstrated its ability to reduce hypertension complications in patients at high cardiovascular risks.