The cholesterol debate

[elte]

Related video in 2 parts:

http://vimeo.com/12515512

"I have high cholesterol and I don't care"

It mentions the "French Paradox" in part 2. Actually, if you don't believe in the established guidelines, it is not a paradox at all. The French drinks the most red wine and eats lots of cheese (supposedly bad for cholesterol) nevertheless their heart disease numbers are low....

The summary of the video: It is the high carb diet that causes heart disease, not the high cholesterol one...

Video about the dangers of statins:

http://vimeo.com/12515845

Drugs almost by definition have side effects. The only drug that comes to mind that I agree about taking is an antibiotic. Aspirin might be OK given the right excuse. Only with an uneasy feeling I might take other drugs.

Best to let the body do it's best by giving what it wants. I can't imagine it wanting drugs.

 

[Syzygys]

I have been studying CoQ10 lately. The heart needs it, and statins (like Lipitor) deplete the body of it.
So if statins don't really prevent heart disease, and they have sideeffect, that is one thing. But actively depleting the body of a needed substance, that is a very negative effect, and I could say, it contributes to heart disease. So as a minimum takers of statins should take extra CoQ10....

Right now I am taking the Red Yeast Rice (for bringing down LDL), just got CoQ10 (because RYR also depletes the body of it) and keep taking the krill oil. In 6-8 weeks I want to get another cholesterol check. In the maintime, I will (try) to watch what I eat, even if it doesn't matter for the cholesterol level...

 

[elte]

I should add to my prior thought that there are exceptions where drugs make sense. Those cases involve genetic irregularities where the body hasn't got the proper instruction manual on how to build and maintain itself. An example is when the diet itself is effectively used as a drug like with Lorenzo's oil. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lorenzo's_Oil

So, supplementation like with coQ10, for example, could be good, but beware of inadvertently interfering with the body's ability to do what it can to maintain itself. Getting too much of something might bind up an essential substance in the body, say, and harm something unforeseen.

Success and good health to you.

 

[Syzygys]

http://easydiagnosis.com/articles/oiling.html

"It was in the same year, 1966, that the results of Dr. Jolliffe’s Anti-Coronary Club experiment were published in the Journal of the American Medical Association.12 Those on the Prudent Diet of corn oil, margarine, fish, chicken and cold cereal had an average serum cholesterol of 220, compared to 250 in the meat-and-potatoes control group. However, the study authors were obliged to note that there were eight deaths from heart disease among Dr. Jolliffe’s Prudent Diet group, and none among those who ate meat three times a day. Dr. Jolliffe was dead by this time. He succumbed in 1961 from a vascular thrombosis, "

 

[chimpkin]

Apparently, the real culprit in atherosclerotic plaque buildup is generalized inflammation. This causes low density lipoproteins to be deposited on blood vessel walls where they form plaques.

That is correct. The problem is that we don't know what causes it.
Now going back to the diet thingy. If cholesterol intake by food has nothing to do with the cholesterol level in the blood, than diet should have no effect whatsoever. But it seems that there is some kind of correlation although not very clear. Some people's cholesterol increases while/after dieting or doesn't show any effect....

If adipose tissue puts out chemicals that cause inflammation...I expect that's part of it.
I seem to remember a connection between heart attack and infection...But I can't find a really good link....there is this though:
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/12/071205190859.htm

 

[BlueBaby]

Syzygys,
I had to have blood work done 5 times last year (not related to cholesterol) but, I asked my cholesterol be checked each time too. It varied from a low of 151 to a high of 215 in a 9 month period. Made me wonder.
BB

 

[WillNever]

That is because cholesterol is significantly impacted by short term diet habits. What you ate in the week prior before can significantly alter cholesterol levels for a blood draw a week later. It is also impacted by if you had fasted or not before the blood draw.

 

[Syzygys]

That is because cholesterol is significantly impacted by short term diet habits.

Yeah, my masterplan was to have a strict diet before my test, but I got an appointment for the next day, so I couldn't get "ready" for it.

But I bet with a little diet I could have dropped 20-30 points at least. Next time I will be more careful...

Here is a funny sceptics on the cholesterol problem:

http://www.thincs.org/Malcolm2.htm#sep16-2004

 

[BlueBaby]

That is because cholesterol is significantly impacted by short term diet habits. What you ate in the week prior before can significantly alter cholesterol levels for a blood draw a week later. It is also impacted by if you had fasted or not before the blood draw.

I did fast each time and the blood was drawn in the morning. But I know it fluctuated and so something (diet like you stated) effected it, so how can a physician or a patient rely on one or two cholesterol readings a year before agreeing to use medication? I ate healthier after the low readings and that is when it went up too. Just a personal experience that's made me ask questions.

BB

 

[WillNever]

Well, it isn't about diet only. Your activity level also has a significant bearing on serum cholesterol.

 

[BlueBaby]

Well, it isn't about diet only. Your activity level also has a significant bearing on serum cholesterol.

Yes, could be, something fluctuates it, but my concern is how cholesterol levels are interpreted for treatment. If I could change my levels from low to high over just 9 months, how often do most doctors check levels before handing out meds.

 

[Syzygys]

Well, it isn't about diet only. Your activity level also has a significant bearing on serum cholesterol.

This is one thing I don't get, how physical activity effects cholesterol? It just doesn't seem to be obvious...

 

[sifreak21]

I just got my cholesterol rechecked after a year, and surprise, surprise, it went up. Well, I didn't change my diet at all, the only thing I have been doing is taking fish/krill oil. Nevertheless my total Cholesterol went up by 40+ points, not what really expected...

Anyhow I am researching the subject, because I don't really want to take Lipitor, as my doctor advised. Side effects and such... Seemingly, Red Yeast Rice has similar lowering cholesterol effect, without harmful side effects, not to mention cheaper.

During my cholesterol research I have ran into this guy who says that most of the thing we know about cholesterol is BS. Now when your book is publicly burnt on live TV (as his was in Finnland) you know you have touched a nerve.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uffe_Ravnskov

He basicly denies the Lipid hypothesis:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lipid_hypothesis

His book's shortened version is here:

http://www.ravnskov.nu/cholesterol.htm

I would like to start a debate/conversation about his opinion, keeping an open mind. If you have personal experience, you are a chemist or just plain smart, don't hesitate to chime in...

Here are mostly positive reviews of his book, basicly a conversation starter:

http://www.amazon.com/Cholesterol-M...sr_1_2_cm_cr_acr_txt?ie=UTF8&showViewpoints=1

P.S.: Correlation doesn't imply causation!!

you cannot listen to any of the bullshit out there on cholesterol. sooo much miss information.. there is a pretty powerful vegan group out there that years ago stated "coconut oil is BAD" and REALLY pushed vegetable oil.

then some people ate exactly waht that group told them not to .. diet consisted of greens loaded with butter. bacon red meat. basically everything this group said was bad.. his doctor was scared to check after he told him what he had ate.. to the doctors amazement his bad C lvl went down and his good C lvl went up

 

[Syzygys]

If you want to reduce cholesterol, then you should know that the most important thing is to remove foods from your diet that are posing a risk.

Except that most of your serum (as in your blood) cholesterol is made by your LIVER, and you don't get it from food. Actually there is an inverse relationship, the less cholesterol your body gets, the more your liver has to make.

Check out the movie Fat head. The guy went on a fat diet, eating everything greasy and sure enough his cholesterol level dropped...

Edit: Also, what the poster said above my post. You can watch the movie Fat head on Youtube, the second part deals with the cholesterol issue, so just watch the last 40 minutes of it....

 

[Cris]

Leaving out the references for the moment - can add them later if requested.

The cholesterol farce summary and why we have been told saturated fat is bad.

1. Some 50 years ago Ancel Keys conducted an extensive study using postmortem analysis on people who had died of heart disease. He found an overwhelming correlation between heart disease and large quantities of cholesterol in the affected arteries. In science we know that correlation does not necessarily equate with causation. A correlation is an opportunity for further investigation. Unfortunately Keys committed possibly the worst piece of science in human history and declared high levels of cholesterol causes heart disease and we are still living with this major error.

Cholesterol, among its extensive uses, is part of the human body defense and repair mechanism. Blaming cholesterol for heart disease is similar to blaming fire fighters for causing house fires since they always appear to be around when one sees a house on fire. Or blaming the police for crimes since they always seem to be around at crime scenes.

2. Keys then conducted extensive studies to show that reducing cholesterol in the diet would reduce the risk of heart disease. He couldn't. His studies showed that limiting cholesterol intake or introducing large amounts had no measurable affect on serum cholesterol.

The body maintains a very tight control of its cholesterol levels. Every cell can make it as well as the liver. If you eat more then the body will make less to compensate. If you eat less or none at all then the body simply makes more to the level it needs. Most of the cholesterol we consume is esterified which means it cannot penetrate the gut wall in any case. Attempting to control your cholestreol through diet, as Keys stated quite accurately in this case, is quite pointless.

3. Keys became convinced that fatty diets will raise cholesterol levels and used the 7 countries study as proof. This study showed a correlation between figh fat consumption and high cholesterol levels for 7 important countries. This became the evidence used to convince politicians to introduce country wide dietary guidelines insisting that saturated fat was bad and needed to be reduced to help avoid heart disease. This became known as the lipid hypothesis and it remains unproven to this day. This was some 30 years ago. Many scientists at that time strongly objected and suggested further analysis was needed. Those further studies were blocked from funding since the authorities said that they knew what caused heart disease, Ancel Keys has told us, so no further studies wwere needed - and this is still the very sorry state of nutrition "science".

The 7 countries study was originally 22 countries, unfortunelaty most of the results didn't show the correlation Keys wanted so he excluded them. If you view the chart with all countries included it is simply a random dot diagram with no correlation. Watch the Fathead video - shows this quite nciely.

At the time the only test for cholesterol was to measure the total only. It is true that a high fat diet does raise total cholesterol. When we talk about cholesterol here we really mean lipoproteins. These are the transporters in the blood for lipids including cholesterol. There are 4 or 5 lipoprotiens although the most well known to the public are HDL and LDL - High Density and Low Density, often mistakenly referred to as good cholestreol and bad cholesterol. The idea is that HDL takes cholesterol away from the heart and LDL take it there. So a ratio of HDL to LDL is seen as important. One would like highish HDL and lowish LDL. A high fat diet tends to raise both HDL and LDL but more HDL than LDL, i.e. saturated fat helps improve the HDL/LDL ratio - wasnt known until recently.

Even more recently we now know that LDL comes in differnt sizes. Small heavy, that can indeed bounce along the artery walls and cause damage, and large fluffy, that float midstream doing the correct job. High fat diets cause a prevalence of large LDL particles rather than the small dense versions.

What a healthy diet in saturated fat will do is overwhelimingly improve your overall lipid profile - improves the HDL/LDL ratio and helps generate healthy large particle LDL. This is of course exactly what you need but current dietary guidelines insist one must reduce fat intake, and hence follow the opposite of what is healthy. The double whammy is that when fat is reduced then people make up the difference with carbohydrates, which of course turns to glucose when digested, which in turn leads to more insulin release.

Glucose is one of the most inflamatory molecules around. We also know now that heart disease is primarily caused by inflamation, and cholesterol is always rushed to sites that are inflamed as part of the repair process. More insulin in the system causes more fat storage, since insulin is the hormone that enables fat storage, it also blocks fat from being burnt for fuel. So less fat and more carb necessarily leads to more fat storage, which is what we see as the obesity epidemic that bagan some 30 years ago when we were told to limit fat and eat healthy whole grains instead. The current diabetes epidemic has the similar cause. Not quite so well known is that Alzheimers is also experiencing an epdidemic - sometimes known as diabetes of the brain.

During this same period cancer rates have gone from 1 in 8 to 1 in 2, another massive epidemic. This is also not surprising - cancer cells can only use glucose as their fuel source (known since the 1920's), and their appetite is agressive. When the dietary guidelines urged less fat and hence more carb, then an increase in cancer risk was inevitable. Deaths from heart disease are in fact levelling out, not because of eating less fat but because we are dying of cancer long before we have the chance to die of heart disease.

Cholesterol itself is a 27 carbon atom chain, synthesized in a fairly complex 40 step process, and where most components are monosacharides - i.e. simple sugars.


All of that because one man decided wrongly some 50 years ago that cholesterol causes heart disease. What has followed is some of the worse science in human history.

 

[Syzygys]

Nice summary, although blaming everything on that asshole Keys is a bit misleading. There are lots of other people/industries to blame too.

One important thing to add is the danger of high tryglicerids. It looks like that not overall high cholesterol is dangerous but high trygs with high level of the small and heavy LDL particles. That combination has a direct correlation and probably causation with heart attacks...

 

[anky2930]

I think thats a very common knowledge

 

[Syzygys]

Of course not, I bet even 80% of the doctors don't know it. Otherwise they wouldn't push the statins...

Let's say you can have a chol level of 300, which would be considered as high, but if your trygs in let's say 150 only and your heavy LDL count is low too, you are fine....

 

[Syzygys]

Yeah, my masterplan was to have a strict diet before my test, but I got an appointment for the next day, so I couldn't get "ready" for it.

This year I am ready for it. My annual check up is in 2 weeks, and I started to take Niacin* 250 mg twice. I didn't experience flushing yet (the main reason I started out with a low dose) and 1 week before the appointment I will go up to 750-1000 mg. I have been taking fish oil 1 pill since September. I am not sure I will have a special diet, maybe less salt in the last 3-4 days.

*There are 3 types of Niacin (B3 vitamin or nicotinic acid):

1. Normal: causes flushing, if it does, one has to start with a low dose and build it up
2. Extended release: it stays in the system longer, causes less flushing, but puts extra work on the liver
3. Non-flush: it actually doesn't work, at all. It doesn't get into the blood. Useless...

 

[Syzygys]

OK, the results are in and I have pretty much passed with almost flying colors:

Total cholesterol: 227 (last year was 288)
LDL : 137 (186 last year)
HDL : 63 (same as last year)
Tryg : 135 (last year 208)

So my regiment of exercise + fish oil (600 mg) + Niacin (500mg) seemed to work fine, because I didn't change my eating habits. A few days before the test I raised the fish oil and Niacin a little, but I wasn't taking much to begin with.
Now someone might say the total number at 227 is still high, but first of all, compared to a year before, that is a very nice drop, second, the 200 is just an arbitrary number what the medical community came up with.They keep pushing that number down, so more people need to take statins.... It is actually the total vs. good ratio that counts.... So as long as your good is high enough, that is alright if your total is high a bit.

The real danger is the high VLDL (they didn't measure) and high Trygs. You can bring down the Trygs with fish oil, among other things... By the way generally I am quite active and my weight has been the same for years, and I am quite skinny...

So all in all, long live research and self medication and leave dangerous drugs (statins) out of your life.... Oh yes, one day before the test I was out of bacon, so I ate a big eggs breakfast. The idea here was that when the body gets cholesterol from food, the liver doesn't need to make as much...

Edit: I have just remembered, but in the last 2 weeks I ate raw garlic 2-3 times. It wasn't planned, I just like garlic. It also have cholesterol lowering effects...