The health of people with diabetes, hypertension and obesity improved when they could get free fruits and vegetables with a prescription from their doctors and other health professionals.
We found that these patients’ blood sugar levels, blood pressure and weight improved in our new study published in Circulation: Cardiovascular Quality and Outcomes.
The improvements we saw in clinical outcomes could have a meaningful impact on overall health. For example, systolic blood pressure, or blood pressure during heartbeats, decreased more than 8 millimeters of mercury, or mm Hg, while diastolic blood pressure, or blood pressure between heartbeats, decreased nearly 5 mm Hg. For context, this is about half the drop gained through medications that lower blood pressure.
