RCTs, the gold standard
Their work focuses only on “real yogurt”, which contains Lactobacillus bulgaricus and Streptococcus thermophilus (LBST), which were used as a treatment in randomised controlled trials (RCTs), the “gold standard” in evidence based medicine. They have identified seven RCTs, involving 278 participants, which met the inclusion criteria. Among these studies, two reported that LBST yogurt significantly improved several parameters: they showed a reduction of total cholesterol concentrations and the ratio of total cholesterol to HDL-C, and plasma glucose.
More studies are needed
However, the authors pointed out the weakness of the conclusions that can be drown from this analysis, as most selected RCTs presented methodological risks of bias. LBST yogurt shows in this review either favorable or neutral effects on metabolic risk markers, but the effects of yogurt consumption per se on risk markers of chronic diseases need to be confirmed by high-quality RCTs.
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