A few extra pounds might do more than test the strength of that belt around your waist, a small study suggests: You could also boost your blood pressure slightly, even if you gain just 5 percent of your body weight.
For the study, researchers told 16 people to consume an extra 400 to 1,000 calories a day for eight weeks. Their blood pressure levels rose a bit on average, although not to an unhealthy range.
But people who put on weight in the abdomen appeared to be at special risk of seeing their blood pressure rise, said study lead author Naima Covassin, a research fellow with the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn.
While it's not clear how the changes could affect cardiovascular health, Covassin noted that "this is the kind of weight gain that occurs over the holiday season, or on a cruise, or in college freshman year."
[For more of this story, written by Randy Dotinga, go to http://consumer.healthday.com/...re-study-691600.html]
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