Tips on lowering cholesterol naturally

[CountrySnail]

Just had a cholesterol test at doctors and my readings were high. Need to get it repeated as i didn’t fast but suspect it will be the same as I only ate a banana beforehand.

I really don’t want to go on statins if I can help it so was looking for some tips to lower the readings by a more natural method with healthy eating and maybe supplements? Anyone done this?

I am very motivated to try different things.
I am a bit overweight so I will do something about that with my diet. No more chocolate and crisps and unhealthy snacks and I will try and up my exercise. Have to admit I haven’t done much apart from walking since Christmas. Don’t smoke and drink alcohol occasionally but not to excess and my blood pressure is ok. I am 62.

I must admit I am quite anxious about this and overthinking and have been under a lot of stress which doesn’t help and this is stressing me out even more.
Thanks.

I have stopped crisps and swapped for rice cakes
added the Aldi cholesterol drinks (plant sterols)
added more fibre to my diet
adding milled seeds to my breakfast

Thank you. I’ve actually just seen a thread about this exact thing with lots of tips.
Ive got the Aldi drinks and ordered some cardio supplements from Holland and Barrett which I will try.

Mine is borderline so been told to cut out saturated fat and to eat more oats

Thanks. I’ve started the changes to my diet already. Blood test is in 2 weeks but realistically it’s unlikely to change in that short time but I’ll try.

Porridge for breakfast. Oats contain powerhouses that gobble up the bad cholesterol like Pac-Man pellets.
Sometimes it’s just genetic. I eat lots of chocolate usually (given up for Lent) and my cholesterol is 3.2. The only time it increased (to 4) was in pregnancy when I ate a lot of pizza.
Diet is unlikely to do anything significant except make you miserable and feel denied. Take the statins is my advice.

By all means do what you can however you like, OP. But, gently, I am not clear why statins have such a bad rap.

High cholesterol runs in my family and nothing helped mine until I somewhat reluctantly started a low dose statin. It’s been clear sailing and my cholesterol came right down. No side effects. Statistically this is the norm.

This was just after menopause.

(My other numbers - such as HDL or ‘good’ cholesterol and such - were always very good but LDL or bad cholesterol was the problem. It’s come down a lot, HDL has come down much less)

By whatever means, good luck.

By all means do what you can however you like, OP. But, gently, I am not clear why statins have such a bad rap.
Same.
DH spent a miserable year trying desperately to reduce cholesterol with diet. He was never remotely over weight and it didn't budge. He ended up taking statins and eating normally. It's obviously better for you overall to eat a healthy diet but he already did and it was joyless trying to reduce fat in a normal healthy diet.

I have a load of health conditions which make me high risk so I agreed to a low dose of statin which brought my already low cholesterol down even further with no ill effects.

A lot depends on your other risk factors but statins have all sorts of benefits and I wouldn't want to have a stroke and think it might have been avoided if I hadn't refused statins.

A very controversial topic is statins and the levels for recommending them has steadily come down over the years. I suggest everyone does their own research and don’t just blindly follow the nhs/drug company narrative. Having said that I am not totally adverse to taking them under the right circumstances.

Try the lifestyle changes which can only benefit you in the long term and if they don’t work then you can think about taking the medicine.

Thank you all. It’s just so difficult trying to research. So much conflicting advice that you end up tying yourself in knots. Some specialists saying they are great but others saying have little effect and cause other problems. Who do you believe?

I shall try the diet and exercise thing because I need to lose weight anyway and if it doesn’t work then think again. At least I will have tried.

Porridge eats cholesterol. Up your oats

Getting started is the most important thing, OP.

As a point of curiosity, which specialists are against statins? My impression is that cardiologists and neurologists are very much in favour of them, when warranted - not that they are against trying other measures first.

There was a big announcement just last week that, following a large review led by academic cardiologists, 11 major American medical organisations are revising downwards the recommended LDL limits. One of the newer hopes, driven by data, is for a reduction in dementia cases.

Does that mean they are lowering the threshold at which statins are recommended?
I read that you need cholesterol for brain health and that reducing cholesterol will potentially cause dementia. As I said, don’t know what to believe.

Yes. I have just looked this up.

The academic paper says the new recommendation will be that everyone over age 30 with LDL-C over 4.14 (I have converted to British units) should be offered statins. The target is 2.56 or less.

Most media reports are dropping the -C and just saying LDL.

If you search on ‘new American statin recommendations’ you can find the results. From last week.

BTW, I don’t minimise the profit motive in American medicine. But many effective statins are old and cheap, so I don’t see it as a driving force here.

Oh that’s interesting. That doesn’t sit right with me. Statins are a trillion dollar industry already. Wonder who financed the research and if it was independently reviewed?

Annoyingly my LDL isn’t on my results, says wasn’t calculated as triglycerides too high
they did my Q risk? Which was 3%

So the global statin market was worth $16-17 billion (US) in 2024. And statins are much more expensive in many other countries than in the UK.

The new American recommendations were developed by a panel funded by the American College of Cardiology, the American Heart Association etc as part of their nonprofit mission. This sounds similar to how my field works. Either academics take small projects as part of our service commitment, with travel and expenses paid, or for big projects a portion of our university work is ‘bought’ by the sponsor and devoted to the project. Big bucks, it is not.

In 2025 a big meta analysis was published in America, reviewing the impact of statins on dementia, with special analyses of Alzheimers disease and vascular dementia. Over 7,000,000 patients were involved; it was the largest analysis of its kind. It looks very good in several important ways.

In all 3 types of dementia statin users had significantly less dementia.

Authors are required to report all grantors and these authors reported that this study had no private grantors and none were pharmaceutical consultants, etc. There were no conflicts of interest. It seemed very clean, financially.

It is true that a good portion of the studies of statins being analysed were funded by drug companies. Because they have the motivation. But academics can, and do, judge the quality of the studies. The large majority of older academic scientists I know take statins.

Are you on any other medication OP?

I know someone who was prescribed statins whilst taking Citalopram. He didn't want the statins so held off for a few months whilst weaning off the Citalopram. When he went back for the next cholesterol test his result was ok and no statins needed.

I would also like to know natural ways. I was put on stations about 6months ago but didn't take them.
Had yearly checkup 2 weeks and been put on them again doctor said I can only advise you if you don't take them you have risk of heart attack
My read was 6.6 and he said something about lower level was 4.45 and should be 2.6

poetryandwine was this 7m people who had dementia and took statins or just 7m people who took statins and the latter didn’t get dementia? . Sorry I’m a bit thick and don’t understand what that means.

The paper reviewed 55 studies of the relationship between statins and dementia. It isn’t my field so I don’t claim full understanding

Publication date is 16 Jan 2025 and the paper is open access. If you search on ‘statins and dementia’ with the date it will come up.

I imagine that the 55 studies had varying protocols. A typical study design would be to follow people, some of whom take statins, for an extended period of time, and to compare the % of dementia cases that develop amongst those who do and do not take statins. You would try to make the ‘Statin’ and ‘Non-statin’ groups roughly equivalent otherwise. (Eg if the statin group is better educated that would skew outcomes. This kind of thing should be assessable by peer experts, which I am not. The journal is high quality and the paper will have been refereed)

IIRC the average length of time subjects were followed was about 7 years. You gave to stop sometime and publish.

I also saw an article on the website of the British Heart Foundation from Spring 2025 focusing on one of the largest of these studies, from Korea. It mentioned that some of the media got carried away - statins as a cure for dementia! - and other media pushed back, exaggerating the dangers of statins.

I missed all the excitement.

Don’t apologise, OP! I think it is great that you are searching rigorously for the best way forward

Finally, I should have emphasised that the BHF site was by no means opposed to people trying diet and exercise in the first instance. They just seem to think that for many, like some of us here, it won’t suffice.

They want our LDL down.

I do many of the things mentioned in this thread. But the best reading I've had for a while was after I'd finished a packet of rooibos tea.

There are studies that show it has an impact on cholesterol. I only drank 1-2 cups a day. Could be purely a coincidence!

An extensive study published in The Lancet, covered by the BBC, shows that statins are effective and even safer than previously thought.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c80142p2g00o

I've been on statins for the past 7-8 years with no issues at all. Contrary to further up the thread about dementia, these have been given to me as precautionary to lower my dementia risk. Because lowering your cholesterol reduces your risk of heart attack or stroke, and heart diseases obviously contributes to vascular dementia.

My cholesterol wasn't high, it was around 5 but on statins it's around 3.4.

Also worth mentioning, that not everyone will be able to reduce cholesterol with lifestyle changes, if you have familial hypercholesterolemia you are fighting a losing battle and will probably need the statins.