A new study in Immunopharmacology and Immunotoxicology suggests that eating oyster mushroom may help control blood sugar in people with diabetes mellitus type 2.
Ravi B at Department of Biotechnology, Karunya University in Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu , India and colleagues tested an alcoholic extract of an edible mushroom called Pleurotus ostreatus or commonly called oyster mushroom and found this preparation lowered glucose levels in diabetic mice significantly.
For the study, normal mice were treated with normal control, diabetic mice with diabetic control, diabetic mice posttreated with standard drug glibenclamide and diabetic mice treated with osyter mushroom extract for 15 days. Diabetic mice contracted diabetes after exposure to alloxan.
As a result, animals treated with the ethanolic extract of oyster mushroom significantly reduced serum glucose levels. Also posttreatment with the extract reduced serum cholesterol, triglyceride and low density lipoprotein cholesterol while serum high density lipoprotein cholesterol was increased significantly in the posttreated mice.
Oyster mushroom extract also increased serum creatinine and urea levels but reduced body weight.
The researchers concluded “The consumption of P. ostreatus produced a significant hypoglycemic effect in diabetic mice and it is capable of improving hyperlipidemia and the impaired kidney functions in alloxan-induced diabetic mice.”
Oyster mushroom has a naturally occurring statin called lovastatin, so it should not be a surprise to see that oyster mushroom extract decreased cholesterol levels in diabetes animals.
The study suggests that eating oyster mushroom may help people with diabetes mellitus type 2.
A clinical trial proves the efficacy of oyster mushroom
Actually, it has been proved in a clinical trial that eating oyster mushroom reduces blood glucose and cholesterol in diabetic men and women.
K. Khatun at Department of Diet and Nutrition, BIRDEM, in Dhaka 1000 and colleagues earlier conducted a clinical trial and proved that oyster mushroom helps reduce cholesterol and blood sugar in people with type 2 diabetes mellitus.
In the study, which was published in Mymensingh Medical Journal, 89 men and women at the mean age of 46.3 years were assigned to use oyster mushroom for seven days and then stopped eating the mushroom for seven days and then resumed another-7-day mushroom dietary intervention.
The researchers found during the first seven day oyster mushroom regimen:
- Mushroom significantly reduced systolic and diastolic blood pressure (DBP).
- It lowered plasma glucose significantly (FPG)
- Mushroom lowered total cholesterol and triglycerides significantly (T-cholesterol and TG)
- Mushroom did not significantly change weight and HDL-c.
When subjects stopped eating mushroom, DBP, FPG, 2hPG, T-cholesterol and TG increased while weight, SBP and HDL-c did not change.
After resuming the mushroom diet, subjects had serum levels of blood glucose, TG and cholesterol decreased again.
The researchers concluded “mushroom significantly reduced blood glucose, blood pressure, TG and cholesterol of diabetic subjects without any deleterious effect on liver and kidney.”
Source: http://www.foodconsumer.org / David Liu PhD
