Study: Pecans can improve cholestrol

Tree nut is high in both healthy fatty acids and fiber.

Your elevated cholesterol levels might be driving you nuts, so it’s only right that a nut — specifically, the pecan — can help lower them.

A new study by researchers at the University of Georgia’s College of Family and Consumer Sciences reports the tree nut can dramatically improve your cholesterol.

Researchers reported participants who ate pecans experienced a 5% drop in total cholesterol and a 6-9% drop in LDL. For context, they compared their results to a meta-analysis of 51 exercises designed to lower cholesterol. Results of that meta-analysis showed only a 1% reduction in total cholesterol and 5% in LDL.

According to the study, after just eight-weeks, participants at risk for cardiovascular disease showed significant improvement in total cholesterol, triglycerides and low-density lipoprotein, otherwise called LDL or “bad” cholesterol.

“This dietary intervention, when put in the context of different intervention studies, was extremely successful,” Jamie Cooper, a professor in the FACS department of nutritional sciences and one of the study’s authors, told UGA Today. “We had some people who actually went from having high cholesterol at the start of the study to no longer being in that category after the intervention.”

Georgia is historically the top pecan producing state in the country, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, yielding about 33% of the nation’s total production.

You can read the full study in the Journal of Nutrition.