DASH Diet Research

The DASH diet has become well established as a model healthy eating plan. It continues to be evaluated in research to discover all the benefits of the program. In addition to promoting healthy blood pressure and cholesterol, the DASH diet supports healthy weight loss, and long-term adherence is associated with lower risk of stroke, heart failure, and osteoporosis, and now has been shown to be associated with lower risk of kidney stones.

The DASH Diet Action Plan is the user-friendly book, that shows how to adopt the DASH diet, and how to incorporate it into a total lifestyle plan, including exercise, and weight loss, if needed. Reap the benefits of the healthy diet to support lowering blood pressure, lowering cholesterol, improving glucose control, and improving health.

• Effects of the DASH diet alone and in combination with exercise and weight loss on blood pressure and cardiovascular biomarkers in men and women with high blood pressure: the ENCORE study. Authors: Blumenthal JA, Babyak MA, Hinderliter A, Watkins LL, Craighead L, Lin PH, Caccia C, Johnson J, Waugh R, Sherwood A. Published in the Archives of Internal Medicine, Jan 25, 2010;170(2):126-35. Adding weight loss and exercise to the DASH diet improves blood pressure regulation and showed improvements in other measures of cardiovascular health.

• Relation of consistency with the Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension diet and incidence of heart failure in men aged 45 to 79 years. Authors: Levitan EB, Wolk A, Mittleman MA. Published in the November 15, 2009 issue of the American Journal of Cardiology. Men aged 45 - 79 years old had a 22% lower risk of developing heart failure if they ate a diet that was consitent with the DASH diet eating plan. The study followed 38,987 men over 7 years.

• Consistency with the DASH diet and incidence of heart failure. Authors: Levitan EB, Wolk A, Mittleman MA. Published in the May 11, 2009, issue of the Archives of Internal Medicine. This study showed that women who followed an eating pattern consistent with the DASH diet were less likely to develop heart failure. The study followed the health history of 36,000 women over 7 years.

• DASH-style diet associates with reduced risk for kidney stones. Authors: Taylor EN, Fung TT, Curhan GC. Published in the October 20, 2009 issue of the Journal of the American Society of Nephrology. This study found that there was a 45% reduction in risk of kidney stones in men and 52% reduction in women who ate diets that followed the DASH diet. The study participants were from the Health Professionals Follow-up Study (with 45,821 men who were followed for 18 years), and from the Nurses' Health Studies with 195,945 women who were followed an average of 16 years.

• Participants in a program to promote weight loss in people with metabolic syndrome lost more weight by adding low-sodium vegetable juice as a component of the DASH diet. [Metabolic syndrome is characterized by a cluster of symptoms, including at least 3 of the following: high triglycerides, elevated abdominal obesity, high blood pressure, low HDL, and elevated blood sugar.] The results were presented by researchers from Baylor, at the Experimental Biology Meeting, in April, 2009.

• Comparison of Strategies for Sustaining Weight Loss, The Weight Loss Maintenance Randomized Control Study. Published in the March 12, 2008, issue of JAMA. This study detailed how people were able to maintain their weight loss while continuing to follow the DASH Diet.

• Adherence to a DASH-Style Diet and Risk of Coronary Heart Disease and Stroke in Women. Published in the April 14, 2008, edition of Archives of Internal Medicine. This study showed that women who followed an eating pattern conforming to the DASH diet, over 24 years of monitoring, had significantly lower rates of heart disease and stroke.

• The efficacy of a clinic-based behavioral nutrition intervention emphasizing a DASH-type diet for adolescents with elevated blood pressure. Published in the April, 2008, issue of the Journal of Pediatrics. Teens who followed the DASH diet, consuming more fruits, vegetables, low fat dairy, and nuts, were able to lower their blood pressure, and improve their diets.

• Deteriorating dietary habits among adults with hypertension: DASH dietary accordance, NHANES 1988-1994 and 1999-2004. Published in the February 11, 2008, issue of Archives of Internal Medicine. This study showed that in general, American's eating patterns have gotten worse over the past few decades, with fewer people eating enough fruits, vegetables, and dairy to provide the benefits that they would see if they were following the DASH diet.
  
  The DASH diet was developed in research sponsored by the National Institutes of Health, and is recommended by the American Heart Association, the Dietary Guidelines for Americans, and is part of the US treatment guidelines for hypertension. The DASH Diet Action Plan was designed to be the user-friendly guide to help people adopt the DASH diet.

Additional recent DASH research reports:

• Dixon LB, Subar AF, Peters U, Weissfeld JL, Bresalier RS, Risch A, Schatzkin A, Hayes RB. Adherence to the USDA Food Guide, DASH Eating Plan, and Mediterranean dietary pattern reduces risk of colorectal adenoma. J Nutr. 2007 Nov;137,11, p.2443-50

• Lin PH, Appel LJ, Funk K, Craddick S, Chen C, Elmer P, McBurnie MA, Champagne C. The PREMIER intervention helps participants follow the Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension dietary pattern and the current Dietary Reference Intakes recommendations. Journal of the American Dietetic Association, 2007 Sep;107, 9, pages1541-51

• Karanja N, Lancaster KJ, Vollmer WM, Lin PH, Most MM, Ard JD, Swain JF, Sacks FM, Obarzanek E. Acceptability of sodium-reduced research diets, including the Dietary Approaches To Stop Hypertension diet, among adults with prehypertension and stage 1 hypertension. Journal of the American Dietetic Association 2007 Sep ; 107, 9, p 1530-8

• Van Horn L. A DASH-ing Success. Journal of the American Dietetic Association 2007 Sep, 107, 9, p 1463.

• Lien LF, Brown AJ, Ard JD, Loria C, Erlinger TP, Feldstein AC, Lin PH, Champagne CM, King AC, McGuire HL, Stevens VJ, Brantley PJ, Harsha DW, McBurnie MA, Appel LJ, Svetkey LP. Effects of PREMIER lifestyle modifications on participants with and without the metabolic syndrome. Hypertension 2007 Oct; 50, 4, p 609-16.

• Nitzke S, Freeland-Graves J; American Dietetic Association. Position of the American Dietetic Association: total diet approach to communicating food and nutrition information. Journal of the American Dietetic Association. 2007 Jul; 107, 7 pages 1224-32

• Mitka M. DASH dietary plan could benefit many, but few hypertensive patients follow it. The Journal of the American Medical Association. 2007 Jul 11;2982, p 164-5.

• Welty FK, Nasca MM, Lew NS, Gregoire S, Ruan Y. Effect of onsite dietitian counseling on weight loss and lipid levels in an outpatient physician office. The American Journal of Cardiology. 2007 Jul 1;100, 1, p 73-5.

• [No authors listed] One on one. What is the DASH diet? Mayo Clinic women's healthsource. 2007 Jul;

• Dauchet L, Kesse-Guyot E, Czernichow S, Bertrais S, Estaquio C, Péneau S, Vergnaud AC, Chat-Yung S, Castetbon K, Deschamps V, Brindel P, Hercberg S. Dietary patterns and blood pressure change over 5-y follow-up in the SU.VI.MAX cohort. The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition. 2007 Jun; 85, 6, p 1650-6 &

• Obarzanek E, Vollmer WM, Lin PH, Cooper LS, Young DR, Ard JD, Stevens VJ, Simons-Morton DG, Svetkey LP, Harsha DW, Elmer PJ, Appel LJ. Effects of individual components of multiple behavior changes: the PREMIER trial. American Journal of Health Behavior. 2007 Sep-Oct; 31, 5, p 545-60

• Levitan EB, Wolk A, Mittleman MA. Relation of consistency with the dietary approaches to stop hypertension diet and incidence of heart failure in men aged 45 to 79 years. American Journal of Cardiology. 2009 Nov 15;104(10):1416-20.

• Taylor EN, Fung TT, Curhan GC. DASH-style diet associates with reduced risk for kidney stones. Journal of the American Society of Nephrology. 2009 Oct;20(10):2253-9.