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New Evidence Fruit and Vegetable Intake Reduces Hypertension

New evidence that increasing average intake of fruit and vegetables to five servings a day reduces blood pressure and cuts the risk of cardiovascular disease has been shown by British researchers.

Dr Andrew Neil and colleagues from the Division of Public Health and Primary Health Care, Institute of Health Sciences, University of Oxford, Oxford, England, said their findings coincide with those of the Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension (DASH) trial, in which an increase in dietary fruit and vegetables for eight weeks reduced systolic blood pressure by 2.8 mm Hg and diastolic pressure by 1.1 mm Hg more than a control diet.

On the other hand, they note that DASH differed fundamentallyin design, since it was a controlled feeding trial with meals prepared according to a common protocol in research kitchens.

The researchers assessed the effect of a six-month intervention to increase fruit and vegetable consumption on plasma concentrations of antioxidant vitamins, daily fruit and vegetable intake, and blood pressure, among 690 men and women between 25 and 64 years of age, drawn from primary care patient lists.

Patients were assigned to either the intervention group, in which participants were encouraged to increase their fruit and vegetable consumption to at least five servings a day (one portion being an 80 gram serving), or to a control group where participants were not instructed to alter their dietary habits.

Fruit and vegetable intake increased by 1.4 servings in the intervention group compared with a very small (0.1 serving) increase in the control group.

Dr Neil and colleagues found that systolic and diastolic blood pressure decreased more in the intervention group than in the control group. In addition, concentrations of alpha-carotene, beta-carotene, lutein, beta-cryptoxanthin, and ascorbic acid increased by more in the intervention group than in the control group.

The researchers note that the falls in blood pressure observed in the study would be expected to produce small clinical effects, but would substantially reduce cardiovascular disease at the population level. A reduction of two mm Hg in diastolic blood pressure results in a decrease of about 17 percent in the incidence of high blood pressure, six percent in the risk of coronary heart disease, and 15 percent in the risk of stroke and transient ischaemic attack, they say.
http://image.thelancet.com/extras/01art9006web.pdf

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