Comment by wwwtyro

Comment by wwwtyro 2 days ago

21 replies

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My understanding is that:

1. When someone consumes fat, bile is released into the gut.

2. Oatmeal (and other soluble fibers like psyllium husk) capture this bile and it is excreted in stool.

3. In order to create the bile, the liver needs LDL. Because the LDL it used to create the bile was lost when it was captured, it exposes more LDL receptors and pulls LDL out of the bloodstream, thereby lowering LDL levels.

It seems to me that in order to maximize the effectiveness of this LDL-lowering approach, one must not simply consume psyllium or oatmeal, but rather consume them in conjunction with fat. Not saturated fat, obviously, which raises LDL, but perhaps unsaturated or polyunsaturated fats. My expectation is that this would trigger the bile secretion required in order to actually sequester it.

mikestorrent 2 days ago

So, me putting butter on my oatmeal is not gross and decadent, but actually the new health food craze?

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  • askvictor 2 days ago

    I make steel cut oats in the pressure cooker; you need to put some fat in there to stop it bubbling while it's cooking, so butter has a physical purpose there too. And also tastes delicious.

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    • bell-cot 2 days ago

      For those who haven't done much cooking - this bubble-busting trick works in a wide variety of situations. Very useful.

      Some proteins seem to have a similar effect - but I haven't tried to narrow that down, and don't know the food science behind it.

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      • slumberlust 2 days ago

        Is this why my grandma put oil in the pasta pot?

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  • Marsymars 2 days ago

    Presumably you'd want something like olive or avocado oil with less saturated fat.

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thesz 2 days ago

VLDL, a precursor for LDL, is produced in liver. Both are more or less the same chemically, but differ in the amount of fat carried. LDL is VLDL but somewhat processed by body, HDL is a VLDL (LDL) completely processed by body.

Bile is used to process food in the gut. It does not go back into our system. Bile is still produced by liver even in long fasts.

Oatmeals is a kind of elimination diet, much like carnivore diet or rice diet. The later one also lowered cholesterol.

What oatmeal diet really does is it completely eliminates essential fatty acids in food. These fatty acids are critical in VLDL production and, thusly, oatmeal diet reduces LDL levels through less production of VLDL.

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jimbob45 2 days ago

By that logic, it would seem that oatmeal would be best placed in a non-breakfast slot, no?

I’m genuinely curious. I have a vested interest in this.

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DennisP 2 days ago

Then it'd be interesting to see a similar study, with some olive oil mixed into the oats.

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