When we think about cardiovascular risk factors, we usually think of high cholesterol.
Cholesterol lowering drugs like statins are the best selling drugs ever and sells for billions every year.
However, high cholesterol is not the only cardiovascular risk factor even if it gets the most attention.
Another risk factor is low grade inflammation even if your doctor may not talk much about that.
There is another well proven risk factor for cardiovascular disease no one usually thinks about, but that does not mean it is not important.
That risk factor is oxidative stress.
The impact of oxidative stress on the cardiovascular system has been investigated.
In on of these studies 114 healthy non-smokers had their carotid intima-media thickness measured using ultrasound (Ashfaq S, et al. 2006).
The intima-media thickness is a measurement of the inner layer of the blood vessel wall and is a way to evaluate atherosclerotic plaque, the buildup of deposits in the blood vessels.
In this study oxidative stress was estimated by measuring blood levels of glutathione which is an important intra cellular antioxidant.
Oxidized glutathione and its so called redox state was also measured.
The redox state is calculated by dividing glutathione with oxidized glutathione and can be looked at as the antioxidant capacity and a measurement of oxidative stress.
Other predictors of intima-media thickness were also measured, these were body mass index, LDL cholesterol, triglycerides, HDL cholesterol and hs-CRP, an inflammatory marker.
The glutathione redox state which is a measurement of intracellular oxidative stress was found to be an independent predictor of early atherosclerosis in an otherwise healthy population.
The body is making glutathione, but we make less as we get older, and we use more since free radical damage to tissue is one of the reasons we age.
Glutathione can be taken as a supplement, but most of the glutathione on the market comes in a form which is not very effective because most of it is oxidized (destroyed) in the stomach.
You need to take glutathione in a form which gets into the cells where it provides protection.
S-Acetyl Glutathione has shown to get into the cells, and it can easily be taken in capsule form.
Ashfaq S1, Abramson JL, Jones DP, Rhodes SD, Weintraub WS, Hooper WC, Vaccarino V, Harrison DG, Quyyumi AA. The relationship between plasma levels of oxidized and reduced thiols and early atherosclerosis in healthy adults. J Am Coll Cardiol. 2006 Mar 7;47(5):1005-11. Epub 2006 Feb 9.
Effective S-Acetyl Glutathione
Glutathione is your primary defense against aging, but regular glutathione is oxidized (destroyed in the stomach) and provides little value. S-Acetyl Glutathione is easily absorbed and provides protection.