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  • Review Article
  • Published:

Nutraceutical therapies for atherosclerosis

Nature Reviews Cardiology volume 13, pages 513–532 (2016)Cite this article

Subjects

Key Points

  • Atherosclerosis is a chronic inflammatory disease of the arterial walls and is the primary cause of cardiovascular disease

  • Statin therapy is not effective in reducing cholesterol levels in a small proportion of users and prolonged use of statins can increase the risk of adverse effects

  • Nutraceuticals are natural compounds derived from food sources that are known to be beneficial against disease

  • Several nutraceuticals have been shown to have anti-inflammatory and antioxidative properties, and are therefore promising compounds to explore as novel antiatherogenic preventive therapies

  • Although some nutraceuticals have shown promise in observational studies, large, robust clinical trials are required to determine their efficacy in attenuating atherosclerotic disease progression

Abstract

Atherosclerosis is a chronic inflammatory disease affecting large and medium arteries and is considered to be a major underlying cause of cardiovascular disease (CVD). Although the development of pharmacotherapies to treat CVD has contributed to a decline in cardiac mortality in the past few decades, CVD is estimated to be the cause of one-third of deaths globally. Nutraceuticals are natural nutritional compounds that are beneficial for the prevention or treatment of disease and, therefore, are a possible therapeutic avenue for the treatment of atherosclerosis. The purpose of this Review is to highlight potential nutraceuticals for use as antiatherogenic therapies with evidence from in vitro and in vivo studies. Furthermore, the current evidence from observational and randomized clinical studies into the role of nutraceuticals in preventing atherosclerosis in humans will also be discussed.

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Figure 1: Formation of an atherosclerotic plaque.
Figure 2: Benefits of nutraceuticals at different stages of the development of atherosclerosis.

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Acknowledgements

Our research was supported by grants from the British Heart Foundation (PG/07/031/22716, PG/08/073/25520, PG/10/55/28467 and PG/12/50/29691). We apologize to all the authors whose work could not be cited because of space limitations, and thank Daryn R. Michael (Cultech Limited, UK) for his valuable input.

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  1. Cardiff School of Biosciences, Cardiff University, Sir Martin Evans Building, Museum Avenue, Cardiff, CF10 3AX, UK

    Joe W. E. Moss & Dipak P. Ramji

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Moss, J., Ramji, D. Nutraceutical therapies for atherosclerosis. Nat Rev Cardiol 13, 513–532 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1038/nrcardio.2016.103

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