Consuming less salt significantly reduces high blood pressure, whether or not you already eat a healthy diet, a new study says.
Doctors routinely urge people with high blood pressure to cut their salt intake. But the new research suggests that even those without high blood pressure can benefit from a low-salt diet.
The study, carried out at Boston’s Brigham and Women’s Hospital, appears in today’s New England Journal of Medicine.
Dr. Frank Sacks and his team tested 412 volunteers. Half ate a typical U.S. diet and half ate mostly fruits, vegetables and low-fat products.
The volunteers also consumed one of three different levels of salt.
The test subjects stuck with each diet for 30 days, then switched to a diet with a different salt content.
The researchers found those who consumed 3 grams of salt a day instead of the usual 9 grams were able to lower their systolic blood pressure – the top figure in a blood-pressure reading – by nearly 7 points on the typical diet, and by 3 points on the fruit-and-vegetable diet.
A healthy diet and lower salt intake “both lower blood pressure substantially, with greater effects in combination than singly,” Sacks concluded.