High Blood Pressure and Supplements

Dietary supplements (often just called supplements) are everywhere you look at least that's what the advertising wants us to believe. We're constantly reminded that we need product X, Y or Z to stay or become healthy, energetic, young, attractive, or whatever else.

Effects on specific illnesses are usually suggested more implicitly than openly advertised. Although supplements may look like medicines in the form of capsules, drops, effervescent or regular tablets, etc., they are legally classified as food and must not be intended to treat or cure diseases. Of course, they should not have harmful effects on health either.

Yet advertising copy and product descriptions often imply such effects. But how much truth is there to that? Because our specialty is blood pressure, we've looked more closely into the topic of dietary supplements.

First, ask yourself whether you actually need the supplement. Apart from certain risk groups, it's usually not necessary to add supplements to your diet. It's far more important to eat a balanced diet. Trying to make up for a one-sided diet with supplements is generally not effective.

Those risk groups can include, for example, pregnant women or people with intestinal diseases who have an increased need for certain nutrients or problems absorbing them from food. In these cases, supplementation that is, intentionally adding nutrients should always be done in consultation with the treating doctor.

Of course, within the wide range of supplements some are better researched than others. But overall, it's noticeable that the effects that can actually be proven almost always fall far short of the advertising claims. This is especially true for newly hyped products that promise a wide range of effects basically everything from hair loss to athlete's foot.

CBD products

One example is CBD oil (cannabidiol oil). Although there are studies by now, many do not support the advertising claims. You can find our detailed article on this here:
Does CBD or hemp oil help with high blood pressure?

Ashwagandha

Ashwagandha is another currently popular example. The plant, known from Ayurveda as the "sleep berry," is credited with strong effects.

If you look more closely, you find various studies that have investigated one effect or another. The best-studied areas are its impact on sleep and a general stress-regulating effect, though even that is described in fairly nonspecific terms.

If you examine the individual studies more closely, a critical reader quickly notices their limitations. The studies mostly ran for only a short time, and the participants, when they were humans rather than animals or lab samples, were young and/or healthy.

Often you'll find limiting phrases listed under "limitations" such as "should be further researched." But with some searching you can also find notes on possible side effects.

For example, people with cardiovascular disease and those taking blood thinners should consult their doctor before taking ashwagandha.

Potassium

There are a few supplements that are reasonably well researched, including their effect on blood pressure. However, desired effects almost always come with possible unwanted (side) effects. One example is potassium, which is often advertised as an alternative salt for people with high blood pressure, but is not suitable, for example, for people with kidney disease.

Zinc

Another example is zinc, which is used not only as an ointment for wounds but also as a dietary supplement in discussions about blood pressure. There are indications that a zinc deficiency may promote high blood pressure, but the current state of research is still not advanced enough to recommend zinc supplementation.

So far studies have been done in mice and rats and on human vascular tissue samples. They aim to explore zinc's mechanism of action to see whether it could become a future target for vesseldirected therapies, i.e., medications.

And zinc is usually obtained in sufficient amounts through a balanced diet. On the other hand, zinc is a heavy metal and overdosing can cause poisoning symptoms and, for example, interfere with copper absorption. A copper deficiency, in turn, can cause neurological problems and anemia.

Magnesium

The situation is similar with magnesium. There are indications that a deficiency can promote high blood pressure, but this must be proven individually. Studies showed an effect of magnesium on blood pressure mainly when a magnesium deficiency was present.

Here too there is a danger of overdosing with potentially serious consequences. Too much magnesium can cause paralysis which can affect the breathing muscles and heart rhythm disturbances up to cardiac arrest.

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Therefore, taking supplements should always be discussed with your treating physician, especially if you take medications. Those medications do not have to be prescribed for the same condition interactions can occur with other drugs as well. That's why it's important, when asked about medication use, to mention not only prescribed drugs but also overthecounter products and any supplements you take voluntarily.

Supplements as effervescent (fizzy) tablets

You should be especially careful with supplements that are taken as effervescent tablets. Because of their high sodium content they can negatively affect blood pressure. Researchers at the Saarland University Medical Center found this. They examined both overthecounter and pharmacyonly effervescent supplement tablets and found they contained an average of 283.9 mg of sodium. The top culprit was a vitamin C effervescent tablet that contained 564.7 mg of sodium thats 28% of the recommended daily maximum sodium intake. And that was in a single tablet. People with high blood pressure should therefore include any effervescent tablets they take when calculating their daily salt intake.

Overall, most people can get all the nutrients they need from food. Overdosing on individual substances is almost impossible with a balanced diet. This contrasts with supplements, where an individual reference value for actual need is often missing and the amounts of active ingredient and dosing recommendations vary widely.

Overdoses are therefore easy to happen. People often say that any excess is simply excreted. But that mainly applies only to healthy (!) people. In people with preexisting conditions, metabolic disturbances can occur, among other problems. You also put an extra burden on an already damaged kidney by having it excrete excess substances, which can worsen existing kidney disease. People with high blood pressure should be especially careful here.

Talk to your doctor about whether adding a particular substance makes sense and is advisable for you. In the best case you only waste money; in the worst case you may harm your health.

This article comes from BloodPressureDB – the leading app since 2011 that helps hundreds of thousands monitor their blood pressure every day. Our content is based on carefully researched, evidence-based data and is continuously updated (as of 03/2024).

Author Sabine Croci is a qualified medical assistant with many years of experience in internal medicine and cardiology practices as well as in outpatient care, and has led BloodPressureDB's specialist editorial team since 2015. Thanks to her extensive additional qualifications as a paramedic, first responder and in various therapy and emergency areas, she provides solid, practical and reliably reviewed information.