Pomegranate juice helps kidney patients

Pomegranate juice helps kidney patients
The health benefits are attributed to the pomegranate juice would be true, at least in kidney patients on dialysis, according to a team of experts from Israel.
The researchers found that kidney patients who drank a few cups of juice per week were less likely to develop infections, the second leading cause of death in more than 350,000 Americans on dialysis.
The results, presented at the meeting of the American Society of Nephrology, Denver, known as Renal Week, have not yet been vetted by independent experts.
"It's an intriguing study," said Dr. Frank Brosius, director of the Division of Nephrology Health System at the University of Michigan, who was not involved in the study. "I know nothing that has a big effect," he told Reuters Health, and warned that other schools should try to replicate the study.
This comes after the United States proved the falsity of a notice of POM Wonderful, which was attributed to products of great benefit against any disease, from heart disease to prostate cancer and erectile dysfunction.
The Israeli team of Bata Kristal, the Western Galilee Hospital in Maharaja, did not use the POM juice, but a product marketed as Naturafood.
In laboratory tests, said Kristal told Reuters Health, that brand had the highest content was of antioxidants, polyphones, which reduce cell damage caused by free radicals. The antioxidants are fruits and vegetables like blueberries or broccoli.
Much more than red wine, for example, "Kristal said.
The team tested whether a diet rich in antioxidants help patients with renal failure because the amount of free radicals in blood increases as blood flows through the dialysis machine. That, in turn, would increase tissue inflammation.
In the study, funded by the Ministry of Health of Israel, 101 patients were instructed to drink a randomized placebo juice like pomegranate juice or real juice.
After drinking half a cup three times a week for a year, the group treated with real juice had a reduction of inflammatory molecules in blood. In addition, needed less hospital visits.
"We found a significant reduction in hospitalizations due to infections: more than 40 percent in the first hospitalization and 80 percent in the second," explained Kristal.
Reuters Health