High Whole Grain Consumption Helps Statin Users Reduce Cholesterol Further

New research suggests that patients taking statins (cholesterol lowering medication) should also consider eating more whole grains for best results. Boston researchers used dietary recall data and cholesterol levels from 4,284 adults age 45 and older from a national nutrition and health survey. While all statin users had lower non-HDL (a combination of LDL and VLDL or “bad cholesterol”) than non-statin users, high whole grain consumption helped even more. Statin patients also eating more than 16 grams of daily whole grains had non-HDL cholesterol levels that were 11 mg/dL lower than those taking statins but not eating as much whole grain. Whole grain intake and statin use were also significantly linked with healthier  total cholesterol/HDL-cholesterol ratios and total cholesterol concentrations.
American Journal of Clinical Nutrition. 2014 Oct;100(4):1149-57. (Wang H et al.)