Originally published March 10 2011
Whey protein fights fatty liver disease and heart disease
by S. L. Baker, features writer
(NaturalNews) New research just published in the journal Clinical Nutrition concludes supplementing the diet with whey protein could be a powerful natural way to reduce the risk of both fatty liver disease and cardiovascular disease.
After just four weeks of adding whey protein to meals, key markers of blood fats in research subjects improved dramatically. That, the team of Swiss scientists noted, means whey protein could reduce the risk of heart disease.
In addition, the whey protein supplementation significantly lowered the amount of fat inside the liver cells of obese women. What makes this finding so important is that it strongly suggests whey protein may be a way to fight liver disease, too.
Although we don't always give the liver much attention, it is critical to purifying the blood by detoxifying harmful chemicals and toxins. People who have extra fat deposited around their middles have been found to be at an elevated risk for a liver harming condition known as non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (http://www.naturalnews.com/025107.html#ixzz1...).
According to the scientists, fatty liver disease is considered to be a component of the metabolic syndrome and closely associated with insulin resistance, impaired glucose tolerance and abnormally high levels of blood lipids including triglycerides and cholesterol.
Murielle Bortolotti from the University of Lausanne, who headed the research, and colleagues gave 11 obese, non-diabetic females diet supplementation with three 20 grams servings of whey protein a day (a total of 60 grams daily) for about a month. At the beginning of the study, the fat inside the livers of the overweight women (technically known as intra-hepatocellular lipid concentrations, or IHCL) ranged between 1.9 and 20.5% of liver volume.
Howver, after four weeks of consuming whey protein, the women's IHCL had plummeted by about 21%, fasting plasma triglycerides decreased by 15% and total plasma cholesterol concentration dropped by over seven percent. Dr. Bortolotti and her co-workers pointed out that the IHCL reduction was not accompanied by any major changes in body weight or body fat mass.
"This therefore indicates that the improved IHCL and plasma triglyceride profiles were to be attributed to an effect of protein rather than to changes in body composition," the research team said in a media statement. They added that their study suggests that a high-protein whey supplemented diet may reduce the risk of both non-alcoholic fatty liver disease as well as cardiovascular disease in obese patients.
For more information:
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/journal...
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