Eating dry-roasted soy nuts may help post-menopausal women lower their blood pressure, according to a study released last week.
Researchers at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Brookline, Massachusetts, said they began looking at soy nuts because women in Japan, where soy consumption is high, have low rates of both heart disease and breast cancer.
They said a study involving 60 women over eight weeks found that a half-cup of dry-roasted soy nuts daily lowered systolic blood pressure by 10% and diastolic blood pressure by 7% among those in the study who had high blood pressure. For women with normal blood pressure, the decreases were 5% and 3%, respectively.
The researchers say the soy nut snack appeared to produce the same drops in blood pressure that some medications do.
While the results are promising, it said, a larger study is needed to confirm them.
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