Vol.:(0123456789) 1 3 Sport Sciences for Health https://doi.org/10.1007/s11332-018-0468-8 ORIGINAL ARTICLE Nitric oxide and blood pressure responses to short-term resistance training in adults with and without type-2 diabetes: a randomized controlled trial Marcelo Magalhães Sales 1  · Caio Victor de Sousa 2  · Hugo Alexandre de Paula Santana 3  · Daisy Motta‑Santos 4  · Lucas Pinheiro Barbosa 2  · Patrick Anderson Santos 2  · Taia Maria Berto Rezende 5  · Rodrigo Alberto Vieira Browne 6  · Rosângela Vieira de Andrade 5  · Herbert Gustavo Simões 2 Received: 13 November 2017 / Accepted: 1 May 2018 © Springer-Verlag Italia S.r.l., part of Springer Nature 2018 Abstract Background Type-2 diabetes (T2D) is associated with endothelial dysfunction, increase in sympathetic tone and several cardiovascular disorders, such as systemic arterial hypertension and coronary artery disease. Aims To determine the efects of resistance training (RT) on the responses of nitric oxide (NO) and blood pressure (BP) in individuals with T2D and their controls peers. Methods Randomized controlled trial in which T2D patients and non-diabetic individuals (ND) performed 8 weeks of RT. Participants were 22 women and 12 men (age 62.3 ± 2.5 years) that were randomly allocated into four groups: T2D training (n = 9), ND training (n = 10), T2D control (n = 8), and ND control (n = 7). NO and BP were measured before and after the whole intervention. Results There were no signifcant diferences in nitrite concentrations between and within groups, with values varying between 1.22 ± 0.15 and 1.45 ± 0.13 Log µM. The T2D and ND experimental groups decreased systolic blood pressure (SBP) by 8.1 and 1.4 mmHg, respectively. However, the control groups showed elevation of SBP (3.6 mmHg for T2D and 4.1 mmHg for ND). Although none of these changes were signifcant (p > 0.05). In addition, T2D subjects who did not undergo the training increased diastolic blood pressure (p = 0.030) and mean arterial pressure (p = 0.054). Conclusions Eight weeks of RT does not increase NO bioavailability, and in turn, does not reduce BP in T2D patients— though it prevented its increase. Trial registration ensaiosclinicos.gov.br (ID: RBR-4d39z9). Keywords Diabetes mellitus · Exercise therapy · Strength training · Hypertension Introduction Worldwide, it is estimated that one in 11 adults has diabetes (415 million people, 8.8% of the world’s population) [1]. Of these, 90‒95% have type-2 diabetes (T2D) [2]. Recent data indicate that 75.4% of diabetes cases are concentrated in low- and middle-income countries [1]. Brazil, classifed as a developing country, is among the four countries with the highest number of individuals diagnosed with diabetes; it has approximately 14.3 million of individuals with dia- betes [1]. Diabetes is associated with endothelial dysfunction [3], increase in sympathetic tone [4] and several cardiovascular disorders, such as systemic arterial hypertension [5] and coronary artery disease [6]. Moreover, hypertension and diabetes coexist very frequently, as 60–65% of T2D patients are hypertensive [7]. The coexistence of hypertension and diabetes can reduce endothelium-mediated vasodilatation, which can be partially explained by a reduced production of nitric oxide (NO) or a decreased NO sensitivity in the vascular smooth muscle [8]. On the other hand, cross-sectional studies involving T2D and/or hypertensive subjects have shown that physi- cal exercise may be able to raise NO bioavailability [9, * Caio Victor de Sousa cvsousa89@gmail.com Extended author information available on the last page of the article