SESAME - RICE BRAN OIL LOWERS BP.

I chanced across a small paper by an Indian worker, that is very interesting. Being a believer in Nutriceuticals and also research work done in the Asians, as opposed to Caucasians, the findings may be more relevant for us.
Dr Devarajan Sankar and colleagues, now working at Fukuoka University Hospital, studied 300 hypertensive patients in India, and presented their findings at the on-going American Heart association Hypertension Research Annual Scientific meeting 2012, at Washington.
They studied 300 hypertensives, dividing them into 3 groups. Gp1 on Nifedipine 30mg/day, Gp2 on 35gms/day of sesame - Rice bran oil, and Gp3, a combination of the two. The patients were put on this regimes for 60days, and after 60 days, they found that all 3 regimes lowered BP significantly. Gp 3 had the biggest fall. In fact, the BP fall in Gp3 was more then 2x that of each of the other groups, and the investigators had to reduce the dose of nifedipine. The BP fall in Gp 1 and 2 were modest, about 14-16 mmHg systolic, and 10-12 mmHg diastolic.

Rice Bran oil is something new to me, so I did a bit of reading. Looks like the rice grain that we have contains oil, in the husk and kernel portion. This can be extracted to make oil that can be used for cooking, and also oil for dipping and salads. The flavour is quite good and fragrant. Now we know that it also has medicinal value. Maybe we should run a campaign to promote Rice Bran Oil, instead of Olive Oil.

In fact, Malaysia is a producer of such oil, and we do export them. I must say that the next time I go to the supermarket, I should look out for it.

By the way, the patients on Sesame-rice bran oil also had a 26% lower LDL-C after 60 days, and a higher HDL-C of 10%. Sometimes, I must say that it may be too good to be true. We surely need a larger study for a longer period of time.
This maybe a simple research paper for aspiring professors in Cardiology.