Garlic plus vitamin C may reduce blood pressure

The Facts:
* Garlic (2.5g per day) together with vitamin C (2g per day) reduced blood pressure (BP) to a normal range after 10 days in patients who had marginally high BP before treatment.
* Garlic reduced systolic but not diastolic BP when used alone and vitamin C had no effect.
* Laboratory tests showed that garlic combined with vitamin C improved nitric oxide production in endothelial cells.

Shaun’s comment: This was an interesting study for several reasons. The study was well designed in that it looked at the effect on blood pressure of the garlic/vitamin C combination, as well as the individual components separately. Another interesting approach was to also investigate a possible mechanism for any benefit, using laboratory tests on blood samples. The findings indicate a benefit in terms of blood pressure reduction for the combination product and a possible mechanism by which this is achieved. Further studies are needed.

Study reference:
http://linkinghub.elsevier.com/retrieve/pii/S027153170700022X