Garlic Prevents Hardening of Aorta.

A dose of garlic in the diet may help to prevent hardening of the aorta, the major artery that carries blood from the heart. The aorta hardens naturally with age, but a more elastic aorta is beneficial because it conducts blood smoothly from the heart and puts less stress on other organs. Moreover, eating garlic benefits people's cardiovascular health more as they get older.

Harisios Boudoulas, professor of internal medicine and pharmacy, Ohio State University, Columbus, collaborated with researchers from the Centre for Cardiovascular Pharmacology in Mainz, Germany. They measured the stiffness of the aorta in more than 200 German men and women, half of whom took 300 mg or more of standardized garlic powder in tablet form every day for two years.

The subjects who took garlic supplements demonstrated a 15% lower average aortic stiffness than those who did not. "The aortas of our 70-year-old subjects who took garlic were as elastic as the aortas of 55-year-old subjects who didn't take garlic," Boudoulas indicates. When the aorta loses its elasticity, it can't expand to accommodate blood, and each pulse from the heart squeezes straight through the narrowed passage at high speed, putting stress on the body. "Every time the heart contracts, it gives stress to the aorta. We've done some studies here at Ohio State to suggest that as we get older, the first organ to suffer is the aorta." The aorta stiffens naturally with age. For men, the process begins in their early 50s; for women, after menopause.

Boudoulas points out that maintaining a healthy aorta may prevent age-related damage to other organs. "When the pulse wave velocity is not too fast, it prevents damage to other organs like the brain and kidneys. So, maintaining a healthy aorta may prevent damage to other organs that normally suffer with age."