Good news for avocado lovers! A moderate fat diet that includes one fresh avocado daily showed greater improvement in certain blood lipid markers when compared to an energy matched moderate fat diet without avocado or a low fat diet without avocado, according to new research published in the Journal of the American Heart Association.
The research, “The Effect of a Moderate Fat Diet With and Without Avocados on Lipoprotein Particle Number, Size and Subclasses in Overweight and Obese Adults – A Randomized, Controlled Trial,” conducted at Pennsylvania State University, evaluated whether incorporating one fresh avocado into the diet daily for five weeks could reduce bad cholesterol levels more than a diet that incorporated monounsaturated fat from vegetable oils high in oleic acid as a substitute for one fresh avocado. The diets were matched for calories and macronutrients, but not for fiber, phytosterols, or other bioactives.
The researchers found that only the avocado diet significantly improved the ratio of total cholesterol to HDL, or “good” cholesterol (TC-HDL/C) and the ratio of LDL, or “bad” cholesterol, to HDL-cholesterol (LDL-C/HDL-C). The low fat diet did not reduce these ratios, and the reduction with the avocado diet was significantly greater than with the moderate fat diet. Additionally, the avocado diet achieved the greatest reduction in LDL-cholesterol compared to the low fat diet and moderate fat diet without avocados.
