A New Way to Extend PAD Walking Distance

Peripheral arterial disease develops when your arteries narrow, reducing blood and oxygen flow to the lower extremities. Once that happens, you can experience pain cramps (known as claudication) with movement, even if you only walk briefly. As such, one of the goals of treatment is to extend the period of PAD walking time you can complete without experiencing claudication. Luckily, new research suggests that taking an over-the-counter vitamin supplement could help you do just that.

Extending Your PAD Walking Distance

An early Nature Communications study revealed that patients with symptoms of PAD that include claudication could extend their pain-free walking distance with a daily OTC supplement called nicotinamide riboside (NR). (More commonly, it's a form of vitamin B3.)

For this study, University of Florida and Northwestern University researchers followed 90 patients with PAD throughout a six-month clinical trial. At the study's conclusion participants who took a daily B3 supplement walked 57 feet farther in a six-minute timed trial than those who took a daily placebo. These findings led study author Christiaan Leeuwenburgh to say, “This is a signal that nicotinamide riboside could help these patients. We are hoping to conduct a larger follow-up trial to verify our findings.”

Extend PAD Walking Distance with Exercise

You can also boost your walking endurance with other lifestyle measures such as supervised treadmill workouts. But if you prefer to exercise on your own, that can still be beneficial. Simply checkout and try the best workout for peripheral arterial disease, after clearing any new form of movement with your doctor.

Seeking PAD Treatment in Georgia

If your disease has progressed to the point where your symptoms are more than mild, we invite you to request a consultation at our Georgia Endovascular center. We offer minimally-invasive PAD treatments such as angioplasty and atherectomy to improve PAD walking distance while relieving other disease symptoms such as changes in skin color or texture; slower growth of leg-hair and toenails; or wounds that are hard to heal. When you come into the office, we can assess your disease progression with a diagnostic angiography to inform your customized treatment plan.