Plant stanol esters and preventing asthma symptoms

Asthma is a chronic inflammatory disease with a significant impact on patients’ quality of life. Currently, there are over 300 million asthma patients worldwide, and this number is expected to increase. Effective treatment options are available; However, long‐term use of these medications unfortunately also leads to side effects. Therefore, a nutritional intervention could offer advantages, particularly in terms of compliance. There is now promising evidence that plant stanol esters, through stimulation of regulatory T‐cells, could have beneficial effects in asthma patients. However, the clinical benefit and the underlying mechanism still need to be demonstrated. In this 12‐month intervention study in asthma patients, we will investigate both the mechanism and the clinical benefit. Asthma patients will consume 3 g/day of plant stanols (provided as plant stanol ester) or placebo. We will regularly analyse clinical parameters, cytokines, and immune cell characteristics. Additionally, participants will receive a vaccination cocktail, allowing us to study how plant stanol intake affect vaccination responses. Although we are investigating the effects of plant stanol esters on immune cell behaviour in asthma patients, the mechanisms and cells studied are also involved in and relevant to a broad range of other chronic inflammatory diseases. Therefore, the knowledge gained may potentially be applied to patients with other conditions. Finally, asthma patients also have an elevated risk of cardiovascular diseases, making it beneficial to reduce their LDL cholesterol levels (a causal risk factor for CVD). In other words, consumption of plant stanol esters by asthma patients may have a double health benefit.