Haha I have to admit that is pretty cool that there are more "natural" substances with healthy properties... kind of like tart cherry juice for arthritis.
However the study behind the beet root claim was based on nine healthy individuals over a period of 3 hours. Great if it works long term too, especially in hypertensive patients. But the research kind of needs to be done... maybe there should be a ND/PhD track 😉.
I took a peek at the study and it sounds like they measured it at 3 hours, but that theoretically the half life was 8 hours for the nitrates if they were pure. Here's the abstract for those interested. My primary concern is that essentially you're going to need, say, 800ml of beat juice a day once you get started in order to maintain the level of affect. Even ignoring the fact that it was only a drop of 10 (so great if you are pre-hypertensive I guess) and that you have be strict with times and with food intake prior, that's really inconvenient to have 800ml of beet juice on hand for your doses. Doable, but error prone. I would also think that when you can get antihypertensives at 5 dollars for target once a month, the beet juice is probably a lot more.
Abstract—Diets rich in fruits and vegetables reduce blood pressure (BP) and the risk of adverse cardiovascular events.
However, the mechanisms of this effect have not been elucidated. Certain vegetables possess a high nitrate content, and
we hypothesized that this might represent a source of vasoprotective nitric oxide via bioactivation. In healthy volunteers,
approximately 3 hours after ingestion of a dietary nitrate load (beetroot juice 500 mL), BP was substantially reduced
(max 10.4/8 mm Hg); an effect that correlated with peak increases in plasma nitrite concentration. The dietary nitrate
load also prevented endothelial dysfunction induced by an acute ischemic insult in the human forearm and significantly
attenuated ex vivo platelet aggregation in response to collagen and ADP. Interruption of the enterosalivary conversion
of nitrate to nitrite (facilitated by bacterial anaerobes situated on the surface of the tongue) prevented the rise in plasma
nitrite, blocked the decrease in BP, and abolished the inhibitory effects on platelet aggregation, confirming that these
vasoprotective effects were attributable to the activity of nitrite converted from the ingested nitrate. These findings
suggest that dietary nitrate underlies the beneficial effects of a vegetable-rich diet and highlights the potential of a
"natural" low cost approach for the treatment of cardiovascular disease. (Hypertension. 2008;51:784-790.)
