Nutriceuticals in cardiovascular disease: psyllium.

In recent years, there has been a growing interest in the use of dietary fiber in health maintenance and disease prevention. A deficiency of fiber in the Western diet may be contributing to the current epidemics of diabetes mellitus, coronary artery disease (CAD), and colonic cancer. The awareness of fiber as a dietary supplement may have contributed to the reported 30% decline in death rate from CAD observed over the past 15 years.