Alternative Remedies for High Cholesterol

Fat doesn’t just get stored in obvious locations like your thighs, butt, chin and belly, it also lines your arteries. Over time this lining becomes thicker and thicker until blood can barely get through. This is called arterial plaque caused in part by LDL Low-density lipoprotein and as a result of its buildup your heart pumps harder and oxygen becomes limited.

Eventually this plaque leads to a variety of ailments including cognitive impairment, slow circulation, heart disease or a heart attack, two major causes of death in America.

If you are responsible enough to have a timely checkup, the high cholesterol in your blood that is causing arterial plaque due to a subpar diet, smoking, or family history may be detected by a doctor. You will most likely be prescribed a high cholesterol medicine, sometimes called a statin, that could be a lifelong commitment.

However, under professional guidance, you may be able to try alternative remedies for high cholesterol. These include a variety of botanical herbs, enzymes, vitamins and more with some of the more popular choices described here.

Unprocessed Oats

Unprocessed oats contain an endosperm on its cellular walls that makes up a healthy combination of dietary fiber. This is called oat beta-glucan which is believed to work with the body to reduce blood cholesterol.

The European Food Council reports how digestion of oats functions,

“…beta-glucan forms a viscous layer in the small intestine. [This] attenuates the intestinal uptake of dietary cholesterol as well as the re-absorption of bile acids (which the body makes from cholesterol). In response, the body draws upon the pool of circulating cholesterol to produce new bile acids. Lower uptake of cholesterol from the gut combined with more bodily cholesterol used for bile acid production results in reduced levels of cholesterol circulating in the blood.”

Stay away from instant oatmeal and instead look for raw or steel cut oats.

Probiotics

Good bacteria replenishment is how probiotics work. An unhealthy diet or excessive antibiotics are two major causes of depleting good bacteria in your gut which has been linked to a variety of systemic health challenges.

One result has been reported in the 2014 Chinese Journal of Biology stating that,

“A study on the reduction of cholesterol showed that Lactobacillus [good bacteria] decreased total cholesterol by 38% when it is given to mice for 7 days in the rate of 104 cells/day. This dose of Lactobacillus reuteri caused a 40% reduction in triglycerides and a 20% increase in the ratio of high density lipoprotein [HDL – good cholesterol] to low density lipoprotein…”

If you have immune problems or take medication for immune deficiency probiotics may not be the best choice.

Red Yeast Rice

Conventional medications are often the result of compounds found in nature. This is the case with red yeast rice (RYR) which contains natural statins that have been shown to mimic synthetic statins in popular cholesterol lowering drugs.

However, RYR has been controversial given its good studies including one published in Bio Med Central (7/18/13) which concluded that,

“…commercially available RYR product showed to be efficient in lowering cholesterol values, with a mean LDL difference of 22%.”

These studies have been theorized to threaten Big Pharma’s top seller cholesterol medications making RYR more difficult to obtain.

Garlic

Garlic is probably one of the simplest cholesterol lowering tools that can be easily implemented into your diet. This wonder herb has been linked to a variety of health benefits and has been found to work best when sliced and left to sit for about five to ten minutes to allow, allicin, its activating compound to form.

A 2001 study by the Department of Nutrition, The Pennsylvania State University published in the Journal of Nutrition found that,

“In a recent randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled intervention study, we showed that aged garlic extract (AGE) supplementation was effective in lowering plasma concentration of total cholesterol by 7% and LDL cholesterol by 10% in hypercholesterolemic men compared with subjects consuming a placebo.”

These alternative remedies for high cholesterol could be a potential replacement to conventional cholesterol managing drugs. Always check with your doctor before attempting these remedies. It is also essential to maintain a healthy non-processed food diet along with a weekly exercise program to keep your cholesterol healthy in addition to chosen remedies.