Relaxed and Flexible

Relaxed and Flexible

In congestive heart failure (CHF), the heart is unable to drive adequate amounts of blood to the organs of the body.

When CHF is mild or in the early stages it can sometimes be successfully treated with an extract of leaves from the crataegus tree – also known as hawthorn. Crataegus extract has been used for many centuries to treat heart problems, and over the past few decades studies have shown that the extract can relax blood vessels and lower blood pressure.

But can this unique extract prevent cardiac related death in patients with advanced congestive heart failure? That’s the daunting challenge a team of German researchers recently put to the test.

Glass half full

Late last month, the results of this new crataegus study were presented at the annual scientific meeting of the American College of Cardiology. Two different news outlets reported the results in a glass-half-full versus glass-half-empty showdown.

Here’s the headline from Heartwire (a service of WebMD): “Hawthorn Extract Ineffective for Systolic Heart Failure.”

And here’s the Reuters Health headline: “Herbal Extract Extends Heart Patients’ Lives.”

Reuters got it right.

• STUDY PROFILE Researchers recruited more than 2,680 patients with advanced CHF
• Subjects were randomly chosen to receive either 900 mg of crataegus extract or a placebo for two years
• During the study period each patient continued to receive their usual medications, which included diuretics, ACE inhibitors, beta blockers and other heart treatments
• At the end of the two-year intervention period, the extract had not prevented death associated with cardiac events, had not prevented non-fatal cardiac events, and had not prevented hospitalization due to CHF, compared to placebo
• But at the 18-month follow up assessment, patients who were taking the extract had a 20 percent reduced risk of CHF-related death compared to placebo – a difference that equaled four additional months of survival time
• No adverse reactions were reported in the crataegus extract group.

Improving exercise

When I looked for other research that might provide a less rigorous test of crataegus extract, I found a 1993 study in which the extract’s relaxing effect on blood vessels increased exercise tolerance in patients with early stages of CHF.

The results of that study were confirmed ten years later in a study that tested more than 200 patients with chronic CHF. Subjects were divided into three groups to receive either 900 mg or 1,800 mg of crataegus extract daily, or placebo. After 16 weeks of intervention, maximum exercise tolerance increased significantly in the high-dose group compared to the other two groups, and heart failure symptoms decreased significantly in both of the extract groups, but not the placebo group.

Laboratory studies have shown crataegus to have powerful antioxidant qualities due to its flavonoid content. In one such study, a crataegus extract prevented the free radical damage of a chemotherapy drug without compromising the drug’s anti-tumor activity.

Crataegus products are more commonly referred to as hawthorn extract and can be found at vitamin shops and through Internet sources. And even though crataegus is well tolerated and doesn’t appear to interfere with medications, be sure to talk to your doctor before trying hawthorn extract products.