Drinking beet juice boosts muscle strength in heart failure patients

For heart failure patients, following a diet rich in nitrates – found in beetroot juice – boosts their muscle power, according to a new study. 

“It’s a small study, but we see robust changes in muscle power about two hours after patients drink the beet juice,” says senior author Linda R. Peterson, associate professor of medicine at the Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis.

Currently, about 5.7 million people in the United States are living with heart failure. Heart failure claims the lives of 375,000 Americans each year. 

Heart failure patients gradually lose their capacity of pumping blood. Numerous clinical studies have shown the helpful effect of exercise training on skeletal muscle energy metabolism, ventilatory capacity, and vascular function. Doctors are urged to stress exercise training for all clinically stable patients with heart failure. [Read more Drinking beet juice before workout boosts brain power in older adults]

This new study was built on the team’s previous work where they showed that athletes such as, cyclists were greatly improved their heart muscles by consuming dietary nitrates.

Active ingredient in the beet juice are the nitrates – found in leafy vegetables such as, spinach, arugula and celery. These nitrates are converted into nitric oxide during exercise. Nitric oxide has many beneficial effects on the body such as– relaxing blood vessels and improving metabolism. The benefits are very common during swimming, cycling or running, when athletes’ breathing is increased to get more oxygen into the body.

The researchers speculated that applying this method on heart failure patients may show similar results, since a heart failure patient gradually loses capacity to pump blood. A weak heart is followed by shortness of breath which makes it very difficult to perform everyday activity.

Researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, U.S.A., picked 90 people who experienced heart failure. Each of them received a beet juice treatment. 

The control group in the study was the patients themselves. All the participants were given the same beet juice, only difference was that some of them had the nitrate removed from their juices – making it a placebo juice. Neither the participants nor the researchers knew the order in which participants the treatment and placebo beet juice.

There was a one to two week break during the trial sessions.

Two hours after consuming the juice, the patients who had beet juice treatment with nitrates reported a 13 percent increase in muscle power in the knee compared to the group that had placebo beet juice. The most benefit was gained by moving the knee at greatest speed. 

Researchers measured the benefit by comparing the improvement through an exercise program.

"I have compared the beet-juice effect to Popeye eating his spinach. The magnitude of this improvement is comparable to that seen in heart failure patients who have done 2-3 months of resistance training,” said Andrew R. Coggan, PhD, assistant professor of radiology at the Washington University School of Medicine.

The patients didn’t experience any major side effects from beetroot juice. The researcher didn’t find any increase in heart rates or drops in blood pressure, which is common in heart failure patients.

The study was published in the journal Circulation: Heart Failure.