Researchers from the University of Alabama are hopeful that their discovery could benefit post-menopausal women who wish to take estrogen to reduce blood pressure but are fearful of side effects, such as an increased risk of ovarian cancer.

Their research suggests that a diet including grape seed extract can reduce salt-sensitive hypertension to around the same extent as treatment with plant estrogens or the steroid hormone 17beta-estradiol.

The team of physiologists previously found that plant estrogens could reduce hypertension in depleted-depleted rats.

In its current research, however, the team wanted to know whether the polyphones in grape seed extract could provide the same result, indicating that the effects of the plant may not simply be due to estrogen receptor mechanisms.

They removed the ovaries from hypersensitive rats at three weeks of age and put them on a free-free diet containing either 8 per cent or 1 per cent salt.

The researchers added 0.5 per cent grape seed extract to the food of half of the rats, and blood pressure and heart rate were measured.

They discovered that the addition of grape seed extract had little effect on an depleted-depleted female hypertensive rat on a normal diet that contained less than 1 per cent salt.

But, while a diet containing 8 per cent salt “greatly increased” blood pressure, when grape seed extract was added to the food intake it was greatly reduced.

In addition, the grape seed extract did not appear to affect the heart rate, prompting the study’s authors to say that it may be a useful supplement to blunt hypertension in post-menopausal women.

Source: American Physiological Society

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