Does Alpha‑lipoic Acid Supplement Regulate Blood Pressure? A Systematic Review of Randomized, Double‑blind Placebo‑controlled Clinical Trials

Abstract

Although several animal and human studies have investigated the effect of alpha‑lipoic acid (ALA) on blood pressure (BP), these fndings are inconsistent. This systematic review of randomized clinical trials was conducted to summarize the evidence on the effect of ALA on BP. PubMed,
SCOPUS, and Google Scholar databases were searched based on MESH term (“Thioctic acid” in combination with “Hypertension” and “Blood pressure”) to identify related papers published up to December 2015. We summarized the results of the relevant studies in this review. In total, nine
studies included in this review, seven parallel‑designed trials and two crossover‑designed trials. The results of parallel‑designed studies are inconsistent. Five studies indicate no signifcant effects for ALA supplementation on BP, but two trials show effects on BP. Unlike parallel‑designed trials, two crossover‑designed trials have shown similar results and both report no effect for ALA on BP. Several studies investigated the effect of ALA on BP. Most of the papers show no signifcant
effect for supplementation and the studies have shown that associations are limited. However, these fndings are limited and there is a need for further and more accurate researches to be clarifed.
Keywords: Alpha‑lipoic acid, diastolic blood pressure, hypertension, systolic blood pressure, thioctic acid