Garlic has long been touted as a food with curative properties.

Now a preliminary study of a pill containing aged garlic extract, vitamins and other nutrients suggests that it may slow the progression of atherosclerosis, a disease of the arteries.

WebMD reported that the study, which included 65 people with an average age of 60 who were at intermediate risk for heart disease, took a placebo pill or a pill containing aged garlic extract, vitamin B-12, folic acid, vitamin B-6 and L-arginine for one year.

The participants were given cholesterol tests and other blood tests every three months and received heart scans at the beginning and end of the study.

For those taking the garlic-and-vitamins pill, their atherosclerosis worsened to a lesser extent. The patients' age, gender, degree of atherosclerosis and other medical conditions at the beginning of the study didn't affect the results, the researchers said.

One of them, Dr Matthew Budoff, associate professor of medicine at the Los Angeles Biomedical Research Institute at the Harbor-UCLA Medical Center, said that it's not clear which ingredient in the pill mattered most.

But he said the aged garlic extract delivered the "primary benefit", though other ingredients may have lowered the patients' blood levels of homocysteine, an amino acid associated with higher risk of heart disease.

The findings were presented two weeks ago and the researchers have called for larger studies of the potential ability of garlic plus vitamins to slow coronary artery calcification.

This article was first published in Mind Your Body, The Straits Times on May 14, 2008.