Are There Any Natural Remedies I Can Take Instead Of Statin Drugs To Bring Down My High Cholesterol?

Jan. 13, 2010 -- Question: Are there any natural remedies I can take instead of statin drugs to bring down my high cholesterol?

Answer:Are there any natural remedies that you can take to bring down your cholesterol? The answer is absolutely, positively yes. The first thing is to know that cholesterol comes from animals. So as I teach my patients, if it has a head, it has cholesterol, or a smiling face. So we need to eat less animal products as a first step to lowering cholesterol. The more animal products that we eat, the higher our cholesterol. We also know that if our triglycerides are high – this is the form of fat that comes from sugar, like cookies, cakes, candies, and ice cream – we can lower our triglycerides through exercise and eliminating simple sugars and carbohydrates. So the first step to lowering cholesterol is diet and exercise. Less animal products, less beef, less pork, less lamb, less cream, less saturated fats. The more we can eat beans and lentils, and green vegetables, foods that come from the earth, the less cholesterol we will have put into our bodies.

If you'd like to take a natural supplement for cholesterol lowering, again I suggest you speak with your physician. However, we know that the omega-3 fish oils will lower triglycerides. We know that fibers will lower cholesterol, and you can even obtain a botanical form of statin which can lower cholesterol as well. All of these should be done with your health care provider. And I recommend that you have a cholesterol check before and two months after so that you can see the impact of your diet, your exercise, and your supplement intervention.