The Great Cholesterol Con

[barn babe]

Malcolm Kendrick's new book "The Great Cholesterol Con" is out debunking the myths about cholesterol and heart disease. This book is easy to read, quite accessible, and does a great slash-and-burn of the diet/cholesterol/heart disease hypothesis. There's not much here to disagree with.

Kendrick has easily laid to waste the ideas that fat and especially saturated fat have anything to do with heart disease. The studies he cites indicate that once somebody decided that saturated fat caused heart disease, nothing would change their minds. The researchers have managed to twist their "findings" to fit their hypothesis in every way imaginable.

Kendrick takes on statin therapy with as much vigor as he does cholesterol. He has an entire chapter that details the reality of the statin situation, that these meds only work for a very small number of people.

If you want the alternative viewpoint on cholesterol and heart disease, a viewpoint that is generally not conveyed in the mainstream media, this book is an informative, often humorous, and easy-to-understand read.

[Barbarella]

This is old news.  There is also a book out (I read it) by Uffe Ravnskov called the "Cholesterol Myths".  He too states its all a myth, high cholesterol will not kill you, you can eat what you want, don't worry etc etc etc.

Whether they are right or not I ask myself where does the high cholesterol go to?  It has got to settle somewhere in your body, and I don't want it to settle in my arteries.

You are damned if you do, and damned if you don't.  My mother in law had this attitude that her cholesterol will not hurt her, refused statins until her carotid arteries got blocked up and she had several strokes.

Statins also have an anti inflammatory in them which is good.  I've been on statins for 4 yrs, and I have no side effects.  However, if I only take one "coated" aspirin my stomach lining will burn for hours unless I take Mylanta with it.

[barn babe]

I already read Ravnskov's book. Colpo's got a book out with the same title as Kendrick's, as well.  I believe Colpo's came out first.  It's cited up the wazoo, whereas Kendrick's book is not, one of my few complaints about MK's book.

If statins have any beneficial effect, it is with the AI properties, as you said. I  wouldn't touch statins with a 10-foot pole, myself. But good for you that they work.

I've been doing a zero carb diet for over 3 years, eat a diet of 75% fat and 25% protein, primarily saturated fat. Also run 7-8 miles a day and pump iron a couple of times a week. Getting ready for the Alcatraz Triathlon. After my last blood check 2 months ago my doc told me to "keep doing what I'm doing." Everything is "great" in my lab work. Too bad for him I don't buy into the cholesterol hype.

[Barbarella]

What works for you doesn't work for everybody else.  I don't know how high your cholesterol is/was and how old you are.  Not everybody can get ready for a marathon run or jog 5-7 miles a day.

My cholesterol shut up 4 yrs ago when I was 59 yrs old.  It shut up within 6 months from 240 to 306, LDL went up to 231.  

I always lived a very healthy life and still do and exercise every day still, I did the diets, all of them for lowering cholesterol for one year to no avail.

I hate to break it to you, if your cholesterol is high due to family history or due to a side effect from meds you HAVE to take, and NOT from eating the wrong food or wrong life style all the diets and exercises will not bring your very high cholesterold down.  I read quite a few books about cholesterol and not just the one from Dr. Uffe.  I read the pro and the con about cholesterol, and learned that if your cholesterol despite daily exercises and very healthy eating does not come down then there are other causes besides eating the right foods and exercising.  

Besides not everybody can run 5-7 miles a day.  There are people who have certain conditions who keep them from running that much, and I am not talking about old age.

If the exercise and diet helped you why should you go on statins?  I and others have to.go on statins.  No, we don't really have to but if we get a stroke or a heart attack we will play the "what if" game and the "if I only had" game, if I only had taken statins maybe I would not have gotten that stroke or that heart attack.

I wish people would stop trashing statins.  We are not morons, we can read about the side effects and can make a decision, and we know when to tell our doctor should we feel certain symptoms/side effects.  The commercials on TV alone spell out the side effects you don't even have to look them up.

Statins are not the only drugs who are overprescribed.  And I'm sure some doctors put patients to quick on statins, but its the patients choice to make that decision.  I personally did not want to walk around with a TC of 306, and an LDL of 231 trying for one year to get it down.

But even then I do not take the statin as I should, I take it every other night, doc doesn't know this.  People have to try themselves what works for them i.e. start out on a low dose like I did.  If the doc insists on certain mg then cut the pills in half.  For me "every other night" worked wonders.  Docs don't need to know everything.

[barn babe]

You missed the one line in my post that probably was most important: I don't believe that cholesterol is related to heart disease. So even if my TC were 500 with an LDL of 300, or whatever, I still wouldn't go on statins.

This forum is for debate and discussion. If you don't want to read a differing viewpoint, perhaps you should go elsewhere. People are free to take or leave anything that's written here. And can choose to ignore it if they like.

I also have read everything out there about cholesterol, both pro and con. Sounds like you believe what the mainstream researchers are saying about it. I don't. Good luck with your drugs.

[ireneo]

I suppose scientists can manipulate the findings to support their hypothesis either way. It's too bad that often they go in with a plan and search for things that support their view. Personally I haven't heard or read the info about cholesterol not being the evil one. I had some doubts after my Dad's first heart attack. He did all the stuff - took his pills, had his blood checked regularly. One day he went in for the tests, all looked perfect. Bang! He had a second heart attack. Kept taking all the drugs only to go on to the 3rd and 4th heart attacks. That's when I figured it wasn't just one thing. Yes, he smoked; no, he didn't really exercise; no, he didn't change his diet very much. But hey, the blood work looked beautiful. I think it's a whole healthy lifestyle, not just cholesterol. Too bad they focus so much on just that.

As for the low carb diet: I've heard many cardios are not pleased with it. The guy that works for my husband was on it, lost weight but ended up with arrhythmias. The doc wasn't too thrilled with the low/no carb diet. Guess it affects the heart in different ways. Me? I'm all for a balanced diet. The body needs a little of a lot of different things. We just need to stop super-sizing it.

[Barbarella]

You're right this board is for discussion, and I hope once you get older that you can continue your lifestyle of running 7-8 miles a day, and pumping iron.  If you can't and your cholesterol keeps on creeping up, and you are to afraid to take statins, that is your choice.  Nobody is putting a gun to anybody's head to take any kind of medication, but don't criticize the people who do.

However, I know of people who are totally against statins because they think they are so bad for their liver but drink like a fish every day.

As far as you wishing me good luck with my "drugs" first of all you don't know how many " prescription drugs" I take, and I hope that you can go through life as you get older without having to take any prescription drugs.  If that is the case, count your blessings, and thank god.

[va_tony]

I just googled 'cholesterol heart attack study' in the 'search news' data base.  The first hit is a Medical News Today press release entitled "Cholesterol-lowering drugs reduce risk of stroke, heart attack". This article describes a recent study involving over 4,000 patients so the statistics appear to be meaningful. There have been many such studies reported in scholarly journals that also support the benefits of a reduction in LDL. I haven't read "The Great Cholesterol Con" and so am curious as to how the author can dismiss all this medical evidence?

[Papethova]

Healthy living, better diets, angioplasties and statin use has resulted in a 4-5 fold decrease in CABG surgeries in the last 10 years.  Ask any surgeon that performs bypasses and he will tell you 10 years ago they were doing 8-10 daily and now they only do 2-3.  This is attributed to people being more health conscious and the use of statins and stents.  Id guess stent use the major factor.

ALL drugs have side effects, actually everything you consume has a side effect.  Its just a matter of the benefits outwieighing the unwanted side effects.

[Barbarella]

You are absolutely right!  

Statins are not the only drugs which "can have" serious side effects.  There is an anti arrhythmia drug on the market which lists "sudden death" as one of the many side effects.  Aspirin can have serious side effects.  Caumadin don't know if I spelled it right, a blood thinner can have serious side effects as in brain hemmorghage if the blood gets to thin, this happened to a distant relative of mine.  And the list goes on.  Hell, certain additives in certain foods can send some people to the ER.

Even vitamins and herbs can have serious side effects in some people.  CQ10 is so highly praised yet it can have serious side effects in some people.  I had these side effects and it took me awhile to find out the cause.  Only the Mayo Clinic lists the side effects of CQ10, that I know of.  And no, it was not the statins, I took the CQ10 way before I ever started taking statins.

Every medicine has a little poison in it,  you are lucky if you can live a healthy, medicine, herb, vitamin free life without any side effects or without the need for any of this stuff.

[anacyde]

Researchers don't have any reason to manipulate data in their favor when it comes to researching heart disease and cholesterol.  There are mountains of evidence that prove cholesterol kills, it's scientific fact.  Why some people are more prone to it's effects is likely a matter of genetics, as there was just a gene linked to a 65% increase in cardiovascular disease and heart attack risk than those without it.  So while cholesterol may not be the only factor, it still stands that it is a factor.  Statins aren't a cure, but for many they provide positive benefits.  All things have their evils, and as with anything, it is a matter of weighing risks versus benefits.  How one chooses to manage their risks is one's own choice.

[Pepperliveson]

Genetics stands strongly with the fact that high cholesterol causes heart disease - Brown and Goldstein won the Nobel Prize for this one.  People with a single inactivating mutation (not complicated genetics) in a receptor responsible for clearing cholesterol from our bodies develop coronary artery disease early, period.  

[ireneo]

I know my comment about researchers "manipulating data" to support their ideas was a bit harsh. Certainly not all of them do that. But too often nowadays I see articles in the paper about some great finding only to see 6 months later that the study was flawed or not done properly. Plus, we all see the reports that this or that is good for you only to find out next year that it isn't good for you. It's all rather frustrating. I'm pretty slow to jump on the bandwagon about anything "new and improved."

[jim62]

I'm curious as to your cholesterol levels.  Your doc may have said "keep doing what you're doing-everything looks great",  but "great" means different things to different docs.  Yours probably knows that saying anything other than what he said would get him off into a severe ****-storm.  When they realize that you don't want to hear it, they tend to go with what they know you want to hear.

Do you have a particular problem with statin drugs?  Any and all drugs?

I feel that your way of thinking will probably change as you mature.

[barn babe]

TC 147, HDL 66, LDL 74. Those were my last readings. I'm reading off the copy of the lab slip my doctor handed me after the testing was done. Frankly, I don't even want to bother getting cholesterol readings any more, since I wouldn't go on statins even if my doctor told me I needed to do so. I always have healthy B.P., low pulse rate, and normal blood glucose readings.

15 years on Atkins, no-carb diet for the last 4 years (and no kidney or liver problems--please do your research on low-carb, it's perfectly healthy.)  (And for those of us who follow zero carb, that usually means fewer than 5 grams of carbs per day, not necessarily "zero" all the time.)  

Last marathon time 4:03 in October.  Rode across the country on my bike last year with no problems. Training for the Alcatraz Triathlon in July. Swimming the Golden Gate in 2 weeks. Planning another marathon in October to BQ (Boston qualify) for April 2008.

I take two krill oil tabs a day, a CarbSmart vitamin-mineral supplement, and a calcium supplement daily. That's it. No prescription meds. I'm 5'7" and weigh about 125. I haven't weighed over 130# in more than 15 years.

I'm not a a believer in the cholesterol hypothesis. I think insulin plays a bigger role.

And I feel I'm "mature" enough now, but thanks, "Jim."  I turned 49 in February.

[jim62]

Numbers sound good to me too.  Similar to mine- no HBP, overweight or inactivity for me.  Very healthy human being.  Was that way right up to my MI in 2003, at 58.

Everything considered, what are you doing on this message board??

[barn babe]

You had an MI at age 58 - my guess is you were also on a high carb "low fat" diet. Kendrick believes heart disease is mainly due to stress. My take is that insulin plays a bigger role in heart disease than cholesterol. Don't tell me - you did "everything right," like following a "low-fat" diet. I'm sorry about your MI, but my opinion on the low-fat dogma is that it's been one giant experiment  gone awry on the American public, and the researchers have too much to lose by backpedaling at this point.  

What am I doing here? Apparently wasting my time, since nobody is even remotely interested in hearing alternatives to the mainstream  cholesterol theories.  

Taubes has a book coming out later this year, supposedly shredding the low-fat b.s. It's not going to change the mainstream opinions on the high-grain low-fat unhealthy diet that's been pushed on Americans for the last 30 years, but it should be an interesting read. Amerika is the fattest nation in the world, and type 2 diabetes is exploding here.  Yet everybody keeps harping on doing the same shite over and over again - don't eat fat, eat grains, lean meat, dairy, and fruits and veggies. Isn't that the definition of insanity - doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result?

Sorry about your MI - hope your health is improving at this point.

I'll bow out of this forum now - you guys clearly want to be left alone with your own theories and beliefs.

[Papethova]

Im curious to your theory on insulin.   How do you think it contributes to cardiovascular disease?  How does high saturated fats help?

[jim62]

Being of the farmer persuasion, I really like that name.

No, I wasn't on any kind of diet in particular.  I've always been a believer in moderation in all things.  I do feel like I have always eaten a pretty healthy diet.  Interestingly, for about the last 8 months before my MI, I was doing the Atkins diet.  I think that's the name of it.  I had lost 20 pounds in that same period with extra exercise and the diet.

This is why I'm a devotee of the idea that the conventional "risk factors" really don't mean a thing.  I think, deep down in my little heart, that cardiac problems are one of those things that one will either have or not have.  In almost all the folks I know that have heart trouble, the risk factors don't seem related at all, including me.  I had no risk factors at all.  It was explained to me that heredity has to start somewhere.  Now there's a comforting thought for you.

Don't go away.  I was just curious what brought you here, since you seem to be totally healthy.  I'm always interested in alternative treatments and ways to do things.  I'm also interested in the insulin connection and what the thinking is.

Keep up the good work.

Jim

[jim62]

As a PS--I'm doing great in spite of the MI.  Wound up having a triple bypass in '03.  Everything is fine since then, thanks for asking.

Jim

[Barbarella]

Its not so much that people do not want to hear about alternatives, and yes its a discussion board, but it also depends how somebody comes across.  I can understand that he is happy and thrilled with his numbers, with his success with the diets and exercise and wants to share it with others.  But he didn't realize that this board is not full of people under 50 with excellent health.  That there are even young people who have certain medical conditions who cannot run 7-8 miles a day, run in a marathon and pump iron.

If he had said "for the folks out there who are of good health and can run 7 miles a day like I do, pump iron like I do, and here is/was my diet you might want to try,  your cholesterol might go down like mine did".  

But to come on in an arrogant way and condemn everybody who is taking statins, and say "good luck with your drugs" like you are some street junkie, he didn't even have the decency to add the word "prescription" before the word drugs.  For some people diets do not help because their cholesterol is not from eating the wrong food.

Should his cholesterol shoot up once he is older or old, and can't run no more, and his diet wont help him no more and if he can live with high cholesterol without worrying what it will do to him more power to him.  You do not have to be a specialist in that field to know that the high cholesterol will settle somewhere in your body.  Its not flushed out with your urine that is for sure.

He might never get high cholesterol and he might get something else as he gets older and needs to take prescription drugs.  My husband had a BP of 110/60 for decades until he turned 60, all of a sudden it jumped to 150, then to 180 and now he is on BP meds.  He made no life style changes.  Doctor said as you get older your arteries harden and that causes the BP to rise.  Believe me he is as calm as a cucumber and doesn't worry about anything including illnesses or dying.  The high BP is not from stress or worrying or all of a sudden eating to much salt in his food.  His lifestyle and eating had not changed.

His BP meds were switched three times because one of them lowered his white blood count to a very low level.  

Statins are not the only drugs who can have side effects.  All drugs do including herbs and vitamins.  

[barn babe]

Jim and Papethova,

You can start here.  


http://www.proteinpower.com/index.php

http://www.proteinpower.com/drmike/

The above website (/drmike) is Dr. Eades' blog, where he comments about saturated fat intake, repudiates the low-fat diet, reviews the current literature, and responds personally to questions.  I also highly recommend reading the book "Protein Power" for an explanation of the physiologic mechanisms behind the healthfulness of a low-carb diet. You can find it cheap/used on amazon or probably at your local library. Wolfgang Lutz's book "Life without Bread" is also excellent and does a good job of explaining why high-carb diets have been a disaster.

And,

http://www.thincs.org/

for information from scientists denouncing the cholesterol hypothesis.

I myself plan to play around with intermittent fasting, along with my zero carb plan. IF has been shown to be as beneficial as calorie restriction in altering physiologic biomarkers of aging. Eades has a blog entry on IF as well. Some folks seem to think it's not WHAT  we eat, but HOW MUCH of it.  I don't eat excess calories anyway because a high-fat diet is so satiating, so it's easy to limit my intake.

[jim62]

Glad you didn't go away.  I'll check out those sites.

I agree with "some folks".  I'm a firm believer in the not what but how much idea.  I go to great lengths to not overeat.  At the same time, I do try to eat what I consider a balanced diet.  Actually, about the only concession I have made post-MI is to not eat anything fried.  Even with that in mind, I still indulge in things like fried chicken every now and then--say, maybe once a month.  While the IF thing may have some merit, it's a bit too radical for me.

Another funny thing.  When I had my MI (with no risk factors) they told me it could relate to my diet and/or lifestyle in the past, maybe as much as 30 or 40 years ago.  With that in mind, I figure any benefits of what I do now likely won't show themselves until I'm about 90 or 100.  So, to make the long story short, who cares?!

Fight the good fight

Jim

[Barbarella]

You're right about the 30-40 yrs ago.  I worked in Neurosonology at a Teaching Hospital for several yrs and was very interested what the patients cholesterol # were who came in to have their carotid arteries scanned, and why they had strokes.

This is what a Neurosonologist told me:  If your arteries are already clogged up or partial clogged up from decades ago and you change your life style now pieces of plaque still can break off from the clogged arteries and cause a heart attack or stroke.  However, if you don't do anything about your high cholesterol it just keeps on building up.

He also told me that research and autopsies were done on soldiers who died in combat as young as 19 yrs old who already had some clogged arteries, and they did not know that.  They did not die from it, but from combat.

As for the Ph.D's and M.D's who write these anti statin books, I have not read once in any of the ones I read "where" the very high cholesterol goes to in your body.  All you read is how high cholesterol is not bad for you blah, blah blah, but if it keeps on building up where does it settle??  In the arteries of course, or in your gallbladder or liver causing problems.  But they don't address that.  

[barn babe]

I've only seen some of the studies on calorie restriction, but it really is shaping up to be a breakthrough in dietary "treatment" of disease states.  It works in every animal on which they test it, including monkeys.  

On low/zero carb, the body is burning body fat for energy (gluconeogenesis takes place to supply glucose to the few organs that require it, such as the brain), and one of the pleasant side effects is the appetite suppressant quality of the diet. (Maybe you recall this from your Atkins days.)  

As such, I've experienced "fasting" and many days I can simply go without food without being hungry or having those bizarre blood sugar swings that come when the glucose levels begin fluctuating  from lack of food intake. What's even more bizarre is I can undergo my regular physical exercise during these times and not feel wiped out if I haven't eaten.

I'm thinking of trying a more  regular IF schedule, however. I was reading about the 20/4 schedules and the 19/5 schedules (fast 20 hours, eat in a 4-hour window, or fast 19, eat 5), and I think something like this would work for me, like start eating at 5 p.m. and close the window at 9 p.m. I want to experiment and see if anything like this changes my moods, my exertional level, or anything else. I don't need to lose weight, so it wouldn't be for weight loss, and I guess I don't need it for my cholesterol, either, but I'd be curious to know how I would do on it.

I'm glad you are restricting calories. This is turning out to be a new exciting area in dietary approaches, and I think it can only be helpful for your heart condition.

What I  can't imagine is that somebody who is eating a high-carb diet would benefit from IF, however. It seems like the introduction of carby stuff after a 20-hour fast would result in a blood sugar nightmare.  The most benefit, of course, would come from IF/LC or IF/ZC.  IMO.