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Thread: Any experience with red yeast rice?

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    Senior Member herbgeek's Avatar
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    Any experience with red yeast rice?

    I have elevated cholesterol, as do all my siblings and Dad. The practitioner wanted to put me on statins, which I declined. My parents both took them for a while and had bad muscle pain as well as forgetfulness. So the practitioner mentioned red yeast rice as an alternative. Has anyone taken this and care to comment on their experience?

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    I tried it once. It did lower the cholesterol but I felt "funny". My mind was foggy and I just didn't feel "right". If I remember correctly, it worked the same as a statin. You may want to do your research. I did not continue and still have high cholesterol. The thing to note, as we age our cholesterol automatically goes up. I won't take statins either based on my research.

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    Senior Member Teacher Terry's Avatar
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    I take a supplement called cholestepure. It lowered it by 40 points in 1 month.

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    It has the same side effect profile as statins - but without the careful dosing and monitoring by a doctor and labs.

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    Senior Member herbgeek's Avatar
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    My provider also recommended blood work at 2 months and 6 months (lipids and liver enzymes) which leads me to believe its really not a healthy alternative. I'm trying to see what else I can do. I already exercise an hour a day, most of my meals are meatless, don't use much saturated fat in cooking, lots of beans. I have the lowest cholesterol of my siblings because of attention to diet, but its still elevated and has been for a long time.

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    My husband had a very bad experience with statins. When he finally went for a check-up a couple of years after he chucked his meds, again he was told that his cholesterol was very high. He refused statins. I suggested that he go on a low-starch, low-refined sugar diet. He kicked violently, as bread is the central part of any meal for him, and he was nibbling pastries all day long and late into the evening. He’s not overweight or anywhere near, and his blood pressure is excellent, so he insisted that he was doing just fine. I’d read up on red yeast rice, and wasn’t really convinced.

    He agreed to try a low refined carb diet, and had another lipid panel done three months later. His cholesterol had dropped to normal levels and his previously scarily high triglycerides were in the middle of the normal range. He ate more meat than usual during this time, less than half his normal amount of bread, and replaced the pastry with fruit.

  7. #7
    Senior Member JaneV2.0's Avatar
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    I've seen many anecdotal reports of people who successfully treated their cholesterol levels with low carb diets, though I'm not convinced that cholesterol levels mean anything, except for triglycerides, which have a strong association with carbohydrates and/or alcohol. What these reports (and much of the scientific literature) indicate is that a "healthy diet" isn't necessarily what the mainstream (advertisers, axe-grinders) thinks it is, and that many of us would benefit from a whole different approach. Eventually, food plans will be individually tailored to one's genetic makeup, which should take the guesswork and trial and error out of it.

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