Browse evidence-based analysis of health-related claims and assertions
Drinking beetroot juice in a warm room doesn't make your blood pressure go down compared to drinking a placebo in the same warm room.
When you're in a cool room, you produce more saliva than when you're in a warm room.
When you drink beetroot juice in a cool room, your body produces more nitrite in your blood than when you drink it in a warm room.
Drinking beetroot juice before going into a cool room stops your blood pressure from going up as much as it normally would when you're cold.
Mixing nitrate (from beetroot juice) with vitamin C might help keep blood vessels healthy in young people, but more research is needed because this study was small.
Drinking beetroot juice with or without vitamin C didn't make a difference in blood vessel health measurements for healthy young adults.
When healthy young adults drank beetroot juice with vitamin C, their daily systolic blood pressure went down a bit compared to before they started the treatment.
When people take nitrate (from beetroot juice) and vitamin C together, their bodies produce more nitrite in urine and saliva than when they take just nitrate or no nitrate.
Taking potassium supplements (like KCl) doesn't lower blood pressure, which shows that the blood pressure-lowering effect of nitrate supplements comes from the nitrate part, not the potassium.
Taking nitrate supplements doesn't change your heart rate, which is good because it means the blood pressure-lowering effect isn't coming from changes in how fast your heart beats.
Women naturally have higher nitrite levels in their blood than men, which may help explain why women typically have lower blood pressure than men.
Drinking beetroot juice (about 1 cup) lowers blood pressure, with the biggest drop being about 5 mm Hg, and it works similarly to nitrate supplements.
Taking nitrate supplements helps protect blood vessels from damage caused by temporary lack of blood flow followed by restoration of blood flow.
Men tend to have bigger blood pressure drops than women when taking nitrate supplements, even though both groups get similar increases in nitrite levels in their blood.
Taking nitrate supplements increases cGMP in the blood, which is a sign that nitric oxide is being produced and working in the body.
People with higher blood pressure to start with tend to see bigger drops in blood pressure when they take nitrate supplements.
When nitrite levels in the blood go up after taking nitrate supplements, blood pressure tends to go down more. The higher the nitrite increase, the bigger the blood pressure drop.
Taking nitrate supplements lowers blood pressure, and the more you take, the more your blood pressure goes down. The biggest drop was about 9 mm Hg for systolic and 6 mm Hg for diastolic blood pressure.
Taking nitrate supplements makes more nitrite in your blood, and the more you take, the more nitrite you get.
Rats using the special mouthwash had a different mix of mouth bacteria compared to rats using regular mouthwash, showing that the type of mouthwash affects the overall bacterial community in the mouth.
Rats using regular antibacterial mouthwash had lower antioxidant protection in their blood after one week, while rats using the special nitrate mouthwash didn't see this change, showing different effects on the body's antioxidant system.
In rats, higher levels of certain mouth bacteria were linked to lower blood pressure, showing how the mouth's bacteria might help control blood pressure.
Rats using the special mouthwash had better antioxidant protection in their blood compared to rats using regular mouthwash, which might help protect against oxidative stress.
Rats using regular antibacterial mouthwash had fewer types of bacteria in their mouths compared to rats using the special nitrate mouthwash, showing how antibacterial products might reduce microbial diversity.