Hypercholesterolaemia treated by soybean protein diet.

Abstract

SUMMARY After a period of stabilisation on a controlled low lipid low cholesterol diet with animal proteins a group of 16 children with familial hypercholesterolaemia were given a textured soybean protein based diet, with a similar fat composition. All the children had a highly significant reduction in total cholesterol, averaging -21-8% against the baseline after eight weeks. Compliance became less strict afterwards, but more than half of the patients have regularly continued the diet and results have been maintained for one year. Minimal changes were noted in triglyceridaemia and in high density lipoprotein cholesterol concentrations, which showed a slight rise only at the end of treatment. The children's growth during the trial was normal. In view of the psychological difficulties of prescribing treatment with drugs to children with severe hypercholesterolaemia before puberty and of the relative ineffectiveness of standard low lipid diets in this condition the soybean protein diet may offer a satisfactory alternative.Hypercholesterolaemia in childhood poses serious therapeutic problems, in that treatment with drugs, although reported as well tolerated,i often conflicts with the physician's desire to avoid chronic treatments during growth. Dietary studies, on the other hand, characterised by a moderate cholesterol intake with increased polyunsaturated/saturated (P/S) fatty acid ratios, often lead to fairly modest plasma cholesterol reduction.2 3More recently, the observation that switching from a low lipid diet with animal proteins to a similar diet with textured vegetable proteins (TVP) extracted from soybean markedly reduces cholesterolaemia in adult patients with type II hypercholesterolaemia has attracted considerable attention. An attempt to modify the type of dietary proteins in children with hypercholesterolaemia has already been carried out, using a vegetarian type of diet (including 60% animal proteins, mostly from milk) with a high linoleic acid content (P/S ratio 1-6).5 Compared with a 'control' diet, with a similar P/S ratio, this vegetarian diet lowered cholesterolaemia by roughly 10%.As it seems possible, based on our extensive experience in adult patients, to provide a reasonably well accepted dietary regimen, by totally substituting animal proteins with TVP from soybean, now 274provided with added lecithin (L-TVP),P we decided to test this dietary approach in a selected group of type II children. Patients and methodsSixteen prepubertal subjects, with an age range of 3 to 12 years, were included in the study.

Soybean protein diet increases low density lipoprotein receptor activity in mononuclear cells from hypercholesterolemic patients.

“…However, although a complete characterization was not carried out, at least three other patients had a genetic pedigree corresponding to type II heterozygosity, and all three conformed with the general pattern of response. We have recently reported the effectiveness of the dietary regimen in a child with homozygous, receptor-deficient type II disease (32), and similar data have been provided by another European pediatrician (33). It should be stressed that LDL from normolipidemic donors were used for the degradation studies, thus ruling out the possibility of a faulty interaction with cell receptors by hypercholesterolemic LDL (34).…”

Ameliorative Effects of Soy 11S Protein on Liver Damage and Hyperlipidemia in Alcohol-Fed Rats

“…This finding parallels the findings of other studies in which it was found that soy proteins lowered the serum cholesterol levels of the subjects. 12,13,21,22) With regards to the total lipid level, the experimental treatment group was found to be significantly different from the negative controls. This finding also confirms the results of Potter, 5) Lovati et al, 8) and Baum 23) and this result is significant since high levels of cholesterol are major causal factors in the development of atherosclerosis and subsequent cardiovascular disease.…”

Effect of 3-month treatment of children and adolescents with familial and polygenic hypercholesterolaemia with a soya-substituted diet

“…These authors stated in their American Heart Association Science advisory that a very large amount of soya protein, more than half the daily protein intake, may lower LDL-C by a few percentage points when it replaces dairy protein or a mixture of animal proteins 9 . Two previous studies investigating the effect of a soya protein-substituted diet in children in a shorter design found a significant larger reduction of TC and LDL-C 11,12 . The difference may be explained by the greater hypocholesterolaemic effect of the run-in (phase 1) diet in the present study, and possibly by a negative dose -response relationship between length of intervention and the decline in LDL-C, as reported in adults by Zhan & Ho 8 .…”