Curcumin Benefits Bypass Patients

Recent research from Thailand indicates that curcumin could help decrease the chances of a heart attack in bypass patients. Part of the interest in this benefit is that, in an unfortunate irony for a procedure intended to improve cardiovascular function, bypass surgery itself can often put patients at increased risk for a subsequent heart attack–this is because of the re-direction of blood flow that is involved during surgery.

The double-blind study consisted of  121 consecutive patients who had non-emergency bypass surgery at  Chiang Mai University hospital between 2009 and 2011. One half were supplemented with one half-gram of curcumin four times daily, beginning three days prior to surgery and continuing for five days afterward, while the other half received placebo.

The researchers found that during their post-bypass hospital stay, 13 percent of patients who’d been taking curcumin had a heart attack, compared to 30 percent of the group receiving placebo. Further factoring for all pre-surgical differences between groups led researchers to the conclusion that the patients supplemented with curcumin had a 65 percent lower chance of a heart attack post-operation.

As this is the first study of it’s kind, researchers were quick to point out that this result is by no means an indication that curcumin will replace medication for bypass patients. It may, however, provide some support for it’s future use in addition to medication.

The likely contributors to this apparent decrease in risk are curcumins antioxidant properties, which worked to help minimize damage to the heart tissue during surgery. This theory is supported by the lowered inflammatory markers displayed by the curcumin group during the study; serum tests revealed lower levels of both C-reactive protein and malondialdehyde in those subjects.

Other research has suggested inflammation plays a role in the development of a variety of diseases, including heart disease — and curcumin could have an effect on those pathways.  The results of this initial study are very encouraging, and certainly provide incentive for further investigation.