You may want to add green leafy vegetables to your diet as according to a recent study, it can help ward off strokes.

According to researchers, reducing stress and increasing green leafy vegetable consumption may be a novel way to reduce the rates of brain bleeds. Intracerebral haemorrhage - bleeding within the brain - takes a high toll on working-age people in Nigeria and Ghana, with high blood pressure accounting for more than 90 percent of this often-lethal type of stroke.

The findings indicated that the people who reported eating more green leafy vegetables had 64 percent lower risk of experiencing a stroke. The team analysed 682 patients of average age 53.7 years at 15 sites in Nigeria and Ghana who experienced brain bleeds. Bleeding strokes accounted for 32.2 percent of all strokes in the study.

Of the bleeding strokes, 93.9 percent were determined to be related to high blood pressure, 7.2 percent to structural abnormalities such as a bulging weak area of a blood vessel and much smaller percentages to other medical conditions or medication use.

Comparing the patients with high blood pressure-related brain bleeds to similar people in the same communities without stroke, the researchers found that the risks were 2.33 times as high in people with diabetes; 2.22 times as high in people who reported more stress at home and work; 1.69 times as high in people with abnormal cholesterol levels and 10.01 times as high in tobacco smokers.

However, the risk was 64 percent lower in people who reported eating more green leafy vegetables. The research is scheduled to be presented at the American Stroke Association's International Stroke Conference 2018 in Los Angeles, California.