High blood pressure affects more than a billion people worldwide and is a major cause of heart attacks, strokes and kidney disease.
Because it often causes no obvious symptoms, many people can have dangerously high blood pressure for years without realizing it.
Doctors have long advised people with hypertension to reduce excess salt, maintain a healthy weight, exercise and take prescribed medicines when needed.
Salt matters because sodium can cause the body to retain water, increasing the amount of fluid the heart must pump through blood vessels.
However, blood pressure is controlled by many systems, not salt alone. Researchers from Pantox Laboratories have proposed that several processes involving hormones, the kidneys, metabolism and diet may reinforce one another and help keep blood pressure high.
One part of their idea involves insulin, the hormone best known for controlling blood sugar. After a meal, insulin helps move glucose from the bloodstream into cells so it can be used or stored for energy.
People who repeatedly have high insulin levels, particularly those with insulin resistance, may experience effects beyond blood sugar. Insulin can influence the kidneys, nervous system and the body’s handling of sodium, all of which can affect blood pressure.
The researchers have therefore suggested that fasting might interrupt some of these processes. During a fast, insulin levels generally fall because the body is no longer responding to incoming food in the same way.
Previous research has reported large blood pressure reductions during medically supervised fasting programs. Some programs have used water-only fasting followed by a diet based mainly on whole plant foods that is also very low in sodium.
Participants in some studies experienced substantial improvements, and some were able to maintain lower blood pressure while continuing the healthier diet afterward. These findings have helped fuel interest in fasting as a possible addition to lifestyle-based treatment.
But it is difficult to know how much of the improvement comes specifically from fasting. Weight loss, lower sodium intake, changes in food quality and other metabolic changes occurring during these programs could all contribute to falling blood pressure.
This is an important limitation because fasting should not automatically be described as a proven way to reverse hypertension. Most people with high blood pressure need long-term management, and stopping medication because blood pressure improves temporarily can be dangerous.
Researchers are also interested in less extreme approaches. One possibility is a protein-sparing modified fast, which provides some protein while sharply limiting other sources of energy.
The goal is to produce some metabolic effects of fasting while reducing loss of muscle. Even so, such diets can cause side effects and are not appropriate for everyone, especially without medical supervision.
Fasting has also attracted attention in research on obesity and type 2 diabetes because periods without food can change insulin levels and the way the body uses stored energy. However, benefits seen for one condition should not automatically be assumed to apply to another.
People taking blood pressure or diabetes medicines need particular caution. Fasting can change blood pressure, blood sugar and fluid balance, potentially making usual medication doses too strong or otherwise unsuitable.
Pregnant or breastfeeding people, children, people with eating disorders and people with certain chronic diseases may also need to avoid fasting. Anyone considering a prolonged or highly restrictive fast should first discuss it with a qualified healthcare professional.
The Pantox Laboratories work presents a biological theory and draws on earlier fasting research rather than establishing fasting as a standard cure for hypertension in a large new clinical trial. The idea therefore needs stronger testing in carefully designed studies that compare fasting with other approaches.
Future research will need to separate the effects of fasting from those of weight loss, reduced salt intake and healthier food choices. Scientists also need to determine how long any benefit lasts and whether fasting reduces heart attacks, strokes and other complications rather than simply lowering a blood pressure reading.
For now, established approaches remain the foundation of hypertension care. These include reducing excess sodium, eating a balanced diet, exercising regularly, maintaining a healthy weight, limiting alcohol, avoiding smoking and using medication when recommended.
Fasting may eventually become a useful option for selected patients under professional supervision.
But the most interesting question is not whether avoiding food for a period is a miracle treatment; it is whether carefully changing when and what people eat can safely improve the biological systems that control blood pressure over the long term.
If you care about high blood pressure, please read studies that early time-restricted eating could help improve blood pressure, and natural coconut sugar could help reduce blood pressure and artery stiffness.
For more health information, please see recent studies about added sugar in your diet linked to higher blood pressure, and results showing vitamin D could improve blood pressure in people with diabetes.
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