Yogurt may help prevent hypertension as part of a healthy diet, an observational study suggested.

People who ate at least the equivalent of one serving every three days were 31% less likely to develop high blood pressure than those who ate no yogurt at all, Huifen Wang, PhD, of Tufts University in Boston, and colleagues found.

An even stronger effect was seen among individuals who were not taking antihypertensive drugs, according to their analysis of the Framingham Heart Study Offspring Cohort reported at the American Heart Association’s High Blood Pressure Research meeting in Washington, D.C.

‘Yogurt is a nutrient-dense, low-fat dairy product,’ the group noted. ‘Higher yogurt intake, as part of a healthy diet pattern, may be beneficial for blood pressure control and hypertension prevention.’

That finding reinforces the known role of low-fat dairy products in reducing blood pressure, Rachel Johnson, PhD, RD, chair of the AHA nutrition committee, commented in an interview with MedPage Today.

The association supports the DASH diet recommendation of two to three servings of low-fat dairy per day.

‘I would encourage my patients to choose fat-free or low-fat yogurt and to watch the amount of added sugars that are in the yogurt to keep the calories down,’ Johnson said. ‘

However, ‘when […]