Table 1.

Characteristics of studies investigating LDL-cholesterol lowering effect of plant stanols consumption in doses of 4 g or more

Reference	Subject characteristics					Treatment characteristics
	N	Age (years)	Men (%)	weight status	Baseline bloodcholesterol	Study design	Vehicle	Dose of plant stanols (g/d)1	Duration (wk)
[10]Nguyen 1999	83	49	30		mildly hypercholesterolaemic	open label, dose-response in comparison to respective baselines	margarine, soya yoghurt	3 / 6 / 10	2
[11]Plat & Mensink 2000	112	33	37	normal	normocholesterolaemic	parallel, randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled	margarine, shortening for baking	0 / 3.82 / 43	8
[12]Cater et al. 2005	8	58	75	slightly overweight	mildly hypercholesterolaemic	cross-over,randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled	margarine	0 / 2 / 3 / 4	6
[13]Gylling et al. 2010	49	62	35	slightly overweight	mildly hypercholesterolaemic	parallel, randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled	margarine, oat based drink	0 / 8.8	10
[14]Mensink et al. 2010	93	56	53	slightly overweight	mildly hypercholesterolaemic	parallel, randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled	margarine, soya based yoghurt	0 / 3 / 6 / 9	4

¹ in each study group, ²vegetable oil based plant stanols, ³ pine wood based plant stanol.