Turmeric Reduce Risk of Heart Attack

A study in Thailand found other benefits of turmeric, a spice native to Southeast Asia. Efficacy newly discovered it is to reduce the risk of heart attack.

This conclusion is obtained after a little research on 121 patients in Thailand. Both 121 patient or the patient's treating physician does not know about the experiments that led Dr. Wanwarang Wongcharoen of the Chiang Mai University. All of these patients had undergone bypass surgery are not an emergency between 2009-2011.

The group was divided into two, one routine pills containing curcumin, a yellow substance in turmeric, and another taking placebo pills that do not contain any properties. Half the patients studied were given one gram curcumin capsules four times a day, starting three days before surgery and five days after surgery. The other half a placebo capsule consuming the same amount.

As a result, only 13 percent of patients who had eaten curcumin having a heart attack while eating placebo 30 percent. After recalculating, the researchers calculated the risk of a heart attack on consumption of curcumin down 65 percent.

Not only that, the patients taking curcumin also had lower markers of inflammation and oxidative stress is lower in the blood. The results of this research published in the American Journal of Cardiology.

Anti-Inflammation

However, this conclusion, according to other researchers, can not be confirmed for a large amount, because it has not been examined in a large scale. However, "Very, very encouraging," said Bharat Aggarwal, a researcher curcumin for cancer therapy from the MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, Texas.

Aggarwal who was not involved in the Thai study suggests, inflammation is an important player in the emergence of a number of diseases including heart disease. And curcumin has anti-inflammatory effects.

"Curcumin years has been shown to reduce inflammation and reduce oxygen toxicity or damage caused by free radicals in a number of trials," said Dr. Jawahar Mehta, a cardiologist at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences in Little Rock, who also was not involved in the study of this Thailand.