Gabe Mirkin, M.D.
Scientists at the National Institutes of Health have shown
why the DASH diet lowers high blood pressure to normal in more
than 80 percent of people with high blood pressure. On the
DASH diet you eat lots of leafy green vegetables that are rich
sources of nitrites, common salts that your bloodstream, can be
converted to nitric oxide which opens blood vessels (Nature
Medicine, December 2003.). This means that nitrites could be a
new treatment for high blood pressure, heart attacks, sickle cell
disease, and blocked arteries leading the heart, brain and legs.
Hemoglobin is the red pigment in red blood cells that carries
oxygen in your bloodstream. When hemoglobin releases
oxygen, it converts nitrites to nitric oxide, to widen blood vessels.
Blood nitrite levels are low in patients with high blood pressure.
However, at high concentrations nitrites are toxic, so you
must take limited amounts. Leafy greens are rich sources of
safe amounts of nitrites. The nitrites go into the bloodstream,
where exposure to oxygen converts nitrites to nitrous oxide which
dilates arteries and lowers high blood pressure. People with high
blood pressure should also eat lots of other plants for the same
reason, and cut back on meat, poultry and processed foods that
are rich sources of sodium which can raise high blood pressure.
See my modified DASH diet
March 1, 2006