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BergaMet, the commercially available natural supplement sourced from the juice of Bergamot oranges grown on the Southern Ionic strip of Calabria, has now been in clinical use for the past three years.  I now have clinical experience in well over 2,000 patients and have been involved in a number of publications with my colleague Professor Mollace, who has headed the seminal research on what I believe to be the most powerful natural product I have had the opportunity to use in my thirty years of practising cardiology. 

The recent vigorous debate about the place of cholesterol, saturated fat and statins in the causation and management of cardiovascular disease, has raised some interesting questions as to the most effective forms of therapy. 

Firstly, my position about statin therapy is that this group of drugs does have an established place in the management of atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease with a very strong evidence base.  Statins, however, should not be used in people at low risk for vascular disease purely because they have an elevated total cholesterol.  In my practice, I utilise a risk management strategy to determine whether pharmaceutical therapy is necessary over and above lifestyle management and the appropriate use of supplements such as BergaMet. 

It is my opinion that BergaMet represents a viable adjunct to enhancing statin effect is an alternative for statin intolerant patients.  Professor Mollace and I have a published paper clearly showing an enhanced benefit on the lipid profile when adding BergaMet to a lower dose of statin, compared with double the dose of statin alone. 

Dr Ross walker

In my experience, a significant number of patients experience significant side effects from statin therapy, especially when used in the long term and anywhere between 10-15% of patients in the real world (not in the very carefully selected randomised control of clinical trials) are completely statin intolerant. 

It is my opinion that BergaMet represents a viable adjunct to enhancing statin effect is an alternative for statin intolerant patients.  Professor Mollace and I have a published paper clearly showing an enhanced benefit on the lipid profile when adding BergaMet to a lower dose of statin, compared with double the dose of statin alone. 

Another major misconception amongst the general public and many members of the medical profession is that LDL cholesterol is the bad cholesterol and HDL cholesterol is the good cholesterol.  It is, in fact, specific subfractions of both LDL and HDL that have detrimental effects.  Small dense LDL cholesterol is the proatherogenic component.  Small HDL is the proinflammatory component.  BergaMet (and not statins) shift (in almost all cases) from small dense LDL to large buoyant LDL and from proinflammatory HDL to anti-inflammatory HDL (small to large HDL).  Again, the Mollace group has soon to be published data, supporting this benefit of BergaMet.  These very important clinical benefits have not been shown consistently with statin use.