Does Red Yeast Rice reduce cholesterol?

[Kitefli]

Has anybody tried "Red Yeast Rice" with or without Statin and found to reduce cholesterol? Any side effects?

webmd.com/cholesterol-manag...

[park_bear]

Cholesterol has gotten a bad rap. See my writing here:

Sugar, Fat And Cardiovascular Disease

tinyurl.com/y5cfmygz

A Tale Of Two Studies Leads To A Deeper Understanding Of Cardiovascular Disease

tinyurl.com/y6agl45j

Do eggs make cardiovascular disease better or worse? What is the root cause of cardiovascular disease anyway? Let us find out.

[rescuema]

Here is more detail on Red Yeast Rice. Does it work? Yes. Has side effects? Yes. healthline.com/nutrition/re...

When you have hypercholesterolemia or dyslipidemia, you need to evaluate what contributed to the problematic state. High cholesterol is a red herring if you're at an intervention level, and yes you do need to act on it since it means metabolic dysregulation.

Evaluate -

1. Are you too sedentary?

2. Are you eating an unhealthy diet combining high fat with high carbs, or too much protein over your metabolic rate?

3. Are you insulin resistant? - I'd say most likely. verywellhealth.com/high-blo...

Some of the supplements that may help -

Niacin

Sunflower Lecithin

High fiber foods

Berberine

Tocotrienols

ubiquinol

etc.

However, nothing beats a healthier diet and exercise, especially not being sedentary when it comes to no potential complications with maximum benefit.

healthunlocked.com/parkinso...

[park_bear in reply to rescuema]

Essential knowledge regarding cholesterol and diet

youtube.com/watch?v=y8pybQj...(Not working as expected?)

[rescuema in reply to park_bear]

It certainly is a video worth visiting for those who're interested in LCHF, Keto, or intermittent fasting diet. I have done extensive research on the topic.

I have tried an extreme keto for over a year several years ago, and I am definitely a lean mass hyper-responder. I have my own strong reasons to believe that the diet is quite unhealthy in the long run for someone with my genetic makeup (athletic and lean), but I won't go into detail with that.

However, I guarantee you that the majority if not all of the folks looking to lowing cholesterol are also with high triglycerides with metabolic dyslipidemia. As I said, high cholesterol is the red herring, not necessarily the culprit, but if you're combining high fat AND high carb and eat a generally unhealthy diet while sedentary, you most definitely need to change what you're doing.

[park_bear in reply to rescuema]

Keto did not agree with me either.

I agree intervention is appropriate in the case of high triglycerides and metabolic dysregulation.

This video is worth watching for anyone who wants to understand the purpose of LDL, which is to transport energy in the form of fat. The level of LDL in the bloodstream can vary dramatically in a short period of time depending on the last three days' diet, as demonstrated in the video. As a result, LDL is pretty much useless as an indicator of cardiovascular disease. Other markers, such as triglycerides, HbA1c, and the ankle brachial index are more useful.

[pwpwifekim]

Yes, it works. I am taking it with my Dr’s support as my blood work confirmed that it reduced my cholesterol. I had issues with leg pain taking a low dose of simvastatin, which I do not have taking red yeast rice. In all honesty, it is more expensive (In the US, you can buy it at COSTCO). It was originally recommended by a friend who worked for a large pharma.

[Kitefli]

I wonder if it is better than taking Statin since more expensive? Statin seems to work for me and covered by insurance.

[silvestrov]

There is an additional alternative to Red Yeast Rice and statins: Olive leaf extract.

Impact of phenolic-rich olive leaf extract on blood pressure, plasma lipids and inflammatory markers: a randomised controlled trial

"Reductions in plasma total cholesterol [−0.32 (±SD 0.70) mmol/L, p = 0.002], LDL cholesterol [−0.19 (±SD 0.56) mmol/L, p = 0.017] and triglycerides [−0.18 (±SD 0.48), p = 0.008] were also induced by OLE compared to control..."

Conclusion

"Our data support previous research, suggesting that OLE intake engenders hypotensive and lipid-lowering effects in vivo."

ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articl...

Also, I recently posted a reply to a question on HU in regards to how my supplement regimen has changed with time. I posted the major change was to include olive leaf extract (OLE) because OLE, in my opinion, it is the best herb to prevent COVID-19. My OLE posting is the final entry in the following thread:

healthunlocked.com/parkinso...

[chartist]

Hi Kitefli,

Assuming that you are currently eating as healthy as you are going to eat, soy lecithin and fenugreek would be choices ahead of red yeast rice, which can have side effects similar to statins because it is essentially a statin and that is not a good thing as statins are known to contribute to memory issues, muscle pain, tendonitis, weak muscles and joint pain. I would think that the last thing that PwP need are more memory issues, more joint pain, more muscle pain and more joint damage.

Here is why I would choose soy lecithin or fenugreek over your doctor's options for lowering your cholesterol. They come with other health benefits instead of the unwanted side effects that red yeast rice and statins can potentially cause and often do.

Statins and muscle, joint and tendon issues:

ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articl....

Statins and memory issues:

health.harvard.edu/choleste...

Red yeast rice is essentially a statin drug with no prescription required and is the active component of the statin drug Mevacor / Lovastatin :

ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articl...

Why Soy Lecithin:

ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articl....

Why Fenugreek :

medicalnewstoday.com/articl...

So to me, Soy lecithin and Fenugreek are much healthier options over red yeast rice (essentially a statin) and statins, which you will most likely be taking for a very long time allowing them to do all of the damage that they are capable of doing in your body or trying the former two to try and get some of the other health benefits that they are noted for also. Of course you would want to opt for a non-GMO soy lecithin. While sunflower lecithin is reported to lower cholesterol, studies are about nil for sunflower lecithin and cholesterol, so if you opt to try that, it will be trial and error to determine best dosing and what effects each dose is having on your LDL, HDL, VLDL and triglycerides, which means regular lab testing.

Art