Cranberry Juice Not Effective Against Urinary Tract Infections, Study Suggests

Drinking cranberry juice has been recommended to decrease the incidence of urinary tract infections, based on observational studies and a few small clinical trials. However, a new study published in the January 1 issue of Clinical Infectious Diseases, and now available online, suggests otherwise.

College-aged women who tested positive for having a urinary tract infection were assigned to drink eight ounces of cranberry juice or a placebo twice a day for either six months or until a recurrence of a urinary tract infection, whichever happened first. Of the participants who suffered a second urinary tract infection, the cranberry juice drinkers had a recurrence rate of almost 20 percent, while those who drank the placebo suffered only a 14 percent recurrence.

Source:

http://www.physorg.com/news/2010-12-cranberry-juice-effective-urinary-tract.html

Original Paper:

C. Barbosa-Cesnik, M. B. Brown, M. Buxton, L. Zhang, J. DeBusscher, B. Foxman. Cranberry Juice Fails to Prevent Recurrent Urinary Tract Infection: Results From a Randomized Placebo-Controlled Trial. Clinical Infectious Diseases, 2011; 52 (1): 23 DOI: 10.1093/cid/ciq073