MENAQ7®: 3 Year Human Study with Vitamin K2 Demonstrates That MenaQ7® Significantly Improves Bone Strength, And Prevents Cardiovascular Aging.
22nd May 2012 Oslo, Norway. NattoPharma today announces the presentation of the recently completed milestone 3-year clinical trial investigating beneficial effects of nutritional doses of natural vitamin K2 (MenaQ7®) on bone and vascular health.
At Geneva’s Vitafoods 2012, Dr. Cees Vermeer, Principal Investigator at VitaK laboratory at Maastricht University, has presented data showing significant benefits for improved bone strength and prevention of cardiovascular aging with daily supplementation of MenaQ7.
In the study, 244 healthy postmenopausal women received for 3 years daily 180 µg K2 from MenaQ7 or a placebo. The clinical measurements included bone mineral density, bone strength, vascular characteristics by ultrasound and pulse-wave velocity (PWV), the latter evaluating age-related stiffening of blood vessels.
MenaQ7 supplementation provided a statistically significant protection of the most vulnerable bone structures i.e. vertebrae and the hip. One of the important findings from the study was that clinically relevant improvement at the site of the femoral neck became evident no sooner than after 2 and 3 years of MenaQ7 supplementation. This finding explains for the first time why shorter studies typically failed to show benefits of vitamin K on bone health and cardiovascular health.
“This study is a breakthrough for MenaQ7 and for the Vitamin K2 market”, stated Executive Chairman in NattoPharma Frode Bohan “never in history such clinical effects have been scientifically documented with Vitamin K2 at nutritional dosage”.
The MenaQ7 trial showed substantial benefits in preventing age-related stiffening of arteries resulting in increase of the PWV in the placebo group, but not in the MenaQ7-group. Most remarkably, MenaQ7 not only prevented stiffening, it also resulted in an unprecedented statistically significant improvement of vascular elasticity both measured with ultrasound techniques and PWV. Previously the positive effects on bone and vascular health have been demonstrated with a pharmacological dose of synthetic forms of vitamin K, of up to 45 milligrams per day. The MenaQ7 study shows for the first time in history of vitamin K evaluation the positive health effects with a “nutritional” dose of vitamin K. Remarkably, the low-dose MenaQ7 effects were even more pronounced than those in trials using a high dose of one of the synthetic forms of vitamin K.
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About MenaQ7
MenaQ7 provides natural vitamin K2 as a fermentation extract whereby vitamin K2 is manufactured using bacillus subtilis natto. This process has the capacity of producing the highly pure and bio-available form of vitamin K2, menaquinone-7 (MK-7). MenaQ7 is the best documented, commercially available natural vitamin K2 with guaranteed actives and stability, clinical substantiation and international patents granted and pending.
For more information on the health benefits of MenaQ7, please visit www.menaq7.com
About NattoPharma
NattoPharma, Norway is a dynamic biotechnology company and the owner and exclusive supplier of the MenaQ7 brand of vitamin K2. NattoPharma has entered into a multi-year research and development program to substantiate and discover the health benefits of natural vitamin K2 for applications in the exciting marketplace for functional food and health food supplements.
For more information, please visit www.nattopharma.com
For more information, please contact:
Bertil Andersson
Chief Operations Officer
Mobile phone: +47 900 91 910
E-mail: bertil@nattopharma.com