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Patients with type 2 diabetes obtained desirable blood pressure control after adding the flavonoid-rich supplement Pycnogenol to their medications.

By Janet Stark, AHSC Office of Public Affairs
June 9, 2008

Patients with type 2 diabetes were able to cut back on their blood pressure medication after they began taking the flavonoid-rich supplement Pycnogenol, according to researchers at The University of Arizona.

Cardiovascular risks increase with type 2 diabetes. These risks include high blood pressure, atherosclerosis (hardening of the arteries) and clotting abnormalities.

For people with diabetes, achieving target blood pressure goals is challenging without increasing levels of the angiotensin-converting enzyme, or ACE, inhibitor medication to levels that cause undesirable side effects. ACE inhibitors are heart medications that widen or dilate blood vessels to improve the amount of blood the heart pumps and lower blood pressure.

In a clinical trial led by Sherma Zibadi, a postdoctoral fellow in the UA department of nutritional sciences and the Sarver Heart Center in the UA College of Medicine, researchers conducted a 12-week study in which volunteers were randomized in a double-blind, placebo-controlled trial to receive either Pycnogenol pills or placebo.

After 12 weeks, patients who took Pycnogenol – a natural plant extract – improved their diabetes control, lowered cardiovascular risk factors and reduced blood pressure medication.

Diabetes mellitus affects approximately 20 million people in the United States, about 7 percent of the population, and is expected to increase by 50 percent to 70 percent within the next 25 years.

Some of the side effects associated with higher doses of ACE inhibitors currently used to control blood pressure include dry cough, elevated blood potassium levels, dizziness, headache, abnormal taste (metallic or salty) and skin rash. More serious, but rare, potential side effects include kidney failure, a decrease in white blood cells and swelling of tissues.

The full study was published in Nutrition Research 28 (2008). The study was supported by a grant from Horphag Research Inc., Geneva, Switzerland, which also provided the Pycnogenol supplement and placebo pills.

Zibadi collaborated with Ronald Ross Watson, professor of public health, interim director of the division of health promotion sciences and professor of family and community medicine. Watson also is a member of the UA Sarver Heart Center.

Zibadi and Watson also studied Pycnogenol and its role in reducing pain and stiffness in adults with knee osteoarthritis. In this placebo-controlled clinical trial, the group that received Pycnogenol reported less pain and stiffness and improved physical function. They also decreased use of nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs, known as cyclooxygenase 2 inhibitors.

While Pycnogenol’s antioxidant and anti-inflammatory properties may be responsible for the beneficial effects, further research is needed to determine the underlying mechanism, according to researchers.