My friend K stays in the loop about matters of health. She forwarded the summary of this study to me.
The trial, published in Nature Communications, involved 15 men and 17 women with metabolic syndrome.
Not in order of appearance in Nature Communications. Limited study by University of Bonn in Germany.
“The level of particularly harmful LDL cholesterol fell by 10 percent for [the oat group] – that is a substantial reduction, although not entirely comparable to the effect of modern medications,” says senior author Marie-Christine Simon, a food scientist at the University of Bonn in Germany.
We were able to identify that the consumption of oatmeal increased the number of certain bacteria in the gut,” lead author Linda Klümpen explains in a press release.
“For instance, we were able to show that intestinal bacteria produce phenolic compounds by breaking down the oats.
“It has already been shown in animal studies that one of them, ferulic acid, has a positive effect on the cholesterol metabolism. This also appears to be the case for some of the other bacterial metabolic products.”
To take the results further, the team tested the effects of dihydroferulic acid – a byproduct produced by gut bacteria breaking down oats – where it appeared to reduce cholesterol storage.
It’s important to note that the results may not apply to everybody in the general population. Volunteers participating in the trial all had metabolic syndrome, a condition associated with excess weight, high blood pressure, and elevated blood sugar that can be a precursor to diabetes.
But given that LDL concentrations remained below starting levels six weeks after the diet had ended, the researchers think they’ve found a biological process worthy of further investigation.
The researchers also ran a second trial in which 17 volunteers ate 80 grams of oats daily for six weeks without other dietary restrictions, compared to 17 controls who did not eat oats.
While there were some benefits, the longer, less extreme oat diet didn’t produce the same rapid cholesterol drop.
Eating oats for every meal for two days cut ‘bad’ cholesterol by up to 10 percent in a small clinical trial.
Surprisingly, the effect was still visible in participants’ blood six weeks after they returned to their normal diets.
The Challenge, such as it is, is to try having an oatmeal meal for breakfast, lunch and dinner for a couple of days. I will try it.
After all, it doesn’t involve drugs, or even a natural supplement.
All The Best 