Appetite suppressant

It's possible, study investigator Dr Carl L Keen said, that vegetable juice helps reduce a person's appetite. "There is also a long-term belief that a high fruit and vegetable diet is associated with lower body weight," added Keen, who is with the University of California, Davis.

All 81 participants in the study, almost three-quarters of whom were women, had metabolic syndrome - a cluster of risk factors including excess body fat around the middle, high blood pressure, high blood sugar and high cholesterol.

Diet plan

All of the study subjects were encouraged to follow the American Heart Association's Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension, or DASH diet, which is high in fruits, vegetables, fiber, minerals and low-fat dairy products and low in saturated fat and salt.

In addition, they were randomly assigned to drink 0, 1, or 2 cups of low sodium, high potassium vegetable juice every day for 12 weeks.

The vegetable juice drinkers - in addition to losing more weight over 12 weeks than the non-juice drinkers - were also more likely to get the recommended 3 to 5 servings of vegetables daily.

Fringe benefits

Vegetable juice drinkers also significantly increased their intake of vitamin C and potassium, while decreasing their overall carbohydrate intake.

"Diet and body weight are key modifiable factors in changing the course of metabolic syndrome," principal investigator Dr John Foreyt, of Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, noted in a written statement.

Most adults don't get the recommended servings of vegetables each day.

Vegetable juice, Keen said, "is a very good, portable option and may be a good way to help close the gap." Keen reported the results of the study, which was funded in part by the Campbell Soup Company, this week at the Experimental Biology convention in New Orleans.

source: Reuters