Hypocaloric diet supplemented with probiotic cheese improves body mass index and blood pressure indices of obese hypertensive patients--a randomized double-blind placebo-controlled pilot study.

Background: Gut lactobacilli can affect the metabolic functions of healthy humans. We tested whether a 1500 kcal/d diet supplemented with cheese containing the probiotic Lactobacillus plantarum TENSIA (Deutsche Sammlung für Mikroorganismen, DSM 21380) could reduce some symptoms of metabolic syndrome in Russian adults with obesity and hypertension.

Methods: In this 3-week, randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled, parallel pilot study, 25 subjects ingested probiotic cheese and 15 ingested control cheese.