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cholesterol

To Everything There Is a Season – Even Cholesterol – (08-30-02)

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To Everything There Is a Season — Even Cholesterol

In 1968, The Zombies made it to #3 on the Billboard charts with a song that reminded listeners it was “the time of the season for loving.” It’s highly unlikely that any group is going to top the musical charts writing about the following subject, but a new study suggests that winter may not be the best “time of the season” when it comes to high cholesterol levels.

Researchers examined 517 healthy people over a 12-month period, documenting their cholesterol levels, diet, activity, exposure to light, and general behavior. While there were no significant changes in diet and calorie intake, cholesterol levels varied an average of 3.9 points per season in men, with a peak increase in December; in women, seasonal cholesterol levels varied as much as 5.4 points, peaking in January.

Overall, 22 percent more participants had total cholesterol levels of 240 or higher (considered high cholesterol) in the winter than in the summer. According to the researchers, the changes in blood cholesterol levels were due in large part to seasonal changes in blood plasma volume, which resulted from changes in temperature and/or physical activity levels between the winter and summer months.

Now that you know the affect of the seasons, have your cholesterol checked. And talk to your doctor of chiropractic about ways to change your diet or increase your activity levels year round. For more on general health and wellness click here.

Reference: Ockene IS, Chiriboga DE, Stanek EJ, et al. Seasonal variation in serum cholesterol levels. Archives of Internal Medicine, April 26, 2004;164:863-870.

 

Statins Have Shocking Benefits in Diabetics

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Back to my favorite topic.  The statin class of drugs to lower cholesterol and prevent heart attacks.  Regular readers of the Rantings will know how I feel about this class of drugs.

To sum it up, they suck at preventing a first heart attack.  Without going into detail here, you can read an overview by clicking on a previous blog article here.

For those of you who have been living in a cave, the statin class of drugs (think Lipitor, Crestor) was designed and promoted to lower cholesterol.  By lowering cholesterol, we made a big jump in assuming that your risk of heart disease would also go down.  After years of the drugs being given out like candy, we realized that the statins just weren’t that good at preventing heart attacks.

Then the studies came out that found that total cholesterol really wasn’t all that great of a risk factor for heart disease anyway.  This left the statins in a huge vacuum.

Luckily, some creative researchers were able to create the idea that statins had “pleiotropic” effects–meaning that their benefit on heart disease was due to other factors besides cholesterol lowering.  The race was on to determine what these additional benefits might be.  Make sense, right?  We have a drug making billions of dollars, so we should find out what they’re good for, right?

First came inflammation as measured by CRP.  Trials (the biggest being the Jupiter trial) were done that looked at whether statins could lower inflammation as measured by CRP.  And it seems like statins were able to lower CRP levels.  Great, so now we have an expensive medication with a long list of side effects that lowers CRP.  The problem?  So does:

  1. Avoiding refined carbohydrates
  2. Losing weight lowers CRP
  3. Exercise lowers CRP
  4. Healthy fats lower CRP levels
  5. Increasing dietary fiber intake lowers CRP levels
  6. Increasing fruit and vegetable intake will lower CRP levels

Overall, when you compare lifestyle changes to statins in preventing heart disease and lowering CRP levels, there is no comparison.

So, scratch the possibility that we should look at statins and CRP levels and hang our prescription hat on this.

Which brings us to this particular study.  Researchers looked at 26 patients with type 2 diabetes taking either simvastatin 40 mg (Zocor) or atorvastatin 10 mg (Lipitor).  Here are the jaw dropping conclusions:

  1. Both lowered cholesterol levels about the same.
  2. Vitamin D levels were increased more in the atorvastatin group.
  3. While inflammation (CRP) and markers of oxidative stress (MDA) were lower, it was because of the higher vitamin D levels.

Sooooo..

Atorvastatin increases vitamin D levels.

A long list of side effects, $200 / month and really sucks at preventing heart attacks.  Why not just take vitamin D?

Withdrawal of Statins Increases Event Rates – (03-28-02)

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Withdrawal of Statins Increases Event Rates

This study finds that when patients go off of their cholesterol lowering meds, the serum cholesterol bounces right back to pre treatment levels. In other words, in no way, shape, or form did the statin drugs change whatever was biochemically wrong with the patient. On the other hand, lifestyle changes, exercise and avoidance of refined carbs can actually alter the physiological landscape in the patient’s favor. It seems very apparent that lifestyle changes should be first line of defense long before medications.

Circulation — Abstracts: Heeschen et al. 105 (12): 1446

Read entire article here

If You Take Statins, You’re Out of Your Mind

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As I’m sure you’re well aware, drugs to lower cholesterol are among the most successful in history. But the list of side effects is quite long, and it just got longer.

I have covered many of the common cholesterol lowering drug side effects in a previous article that can be read by clicking here.  Many of these side effects can be predicted based on the fact that statins, while lowering your cholesterol number (and let’s face it–that’s pretty much all they do is lower the number of a single marker in your bloodstream) they also block the production of a compound called Coenzyme Q10, or CoQ10.

Another name for CoQ10 is ubiquinone is because it is present everywhere in our cells.  And it’s there because it’s important for every single cell to generate energy for that cell to function the way it was supposed to function.  Kind of makes you wonder why Mother Nature put the path to create cholesterol on the same path as something as critically important as CoQ10, huh?

So basically, when a cholesterol lowering drug lowers CoQ10 in the cell, all kinds of bad things can happen to pretty much every cell in the body, the worst side effect being death from fatal rhabdomyolosis, a condition where your muscle essentially melt away from the massive damage.  The debris that gets kicked into your circulation essentially shuts down the kidneys.

Most notably, any cell with a high metabolic activity that requires lots of energy (in the form of ATP) can suffer from the statin class of drugs.  That is why the heart can be damaged by statins (kind of ironic, don’t you think) and why muscle aches and pains are the greatest problems with statin use.

However, the largest utilizer of glucose in the human body at rest is the central nervous system.  Yes–your brain.

So, could this class of drugs to lower cholesterol lead to brain damage?  It certainly makes sense and is supported by the results in this particular study.

Granted, the group of patients studied were patients who had pre-existing cardiovascular disease (and would almost all be put on statins) and had an implantable cardioverter defibrillator (ICD) put in as a result.  So maybe not your average population and probably doesn’t apply to you directly.  However, it is highly likely that the brain cells of these patients with the ICD function pretty darn close to the way your brain cells function, so don’t dismiss the results too quickly.

For those of you in the mental health field, researchers used both the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale and the Medical Outcomes Study Short Form 36-item Health Survey.  Overall, of 409 patients in this study, 60% were on statins.

Here’s what they found on statin use (regardless of the type of statin used or the dosage):

  • Associated with poorer physical role limitations (basically–physical things were more challenging).
  • Poorer social functioning
  • Poorer emotional role limitations
  • There was an association with depression and physical functioning as well, but the relationship was not as strong.
  • Overall, statin therapy was associated with impaired health status on 3 of the 8 on the SF36-item Health Survey (Tweet this).

Overall, it was clear that, at least in this specific population, statin drugs led to a deterioration in health and mental health status as a result of taking drugs to lower cholesterol.  To be fair, the benefits of the statin class of drugs IS better in secondary preventation (preventing a second heart attack) so the risk / benefit ratio may be different than in primary prevention (preventing that first heart attack).

However, remember that lifestyle changes (my recommendations can be found by clicking here) do NOT worsen cognitive function or damage muscles or increase the risk of arthritis or make your eyeballs pop out and dangle by the optic nerve.

Benefits of low glycemic index diet and high glycemic index diet – (08-11-04)

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No difference in body weight decrease between a low-glycemic-index and a high-glycemic-index diet but reduced LDL cholesterol after 10-wk ad libitum intake of the low-glycemic-index diet

Here’s the gist of this one. A low glycemic index diet (the preferred, healthier diet with whole grains and avoidance of refined carbs) did not show any benefit over a high glycemic index diet. So, most would look at this and say, “Hah–they don’t know what they’re talking about!!! Hand me that donut….

However, the study was 10 weeks long. 10 weeks. 2 1/2 months. No wonder people are confused about what they should eat. Women subjects in this study ranged from 20-40 years of age. I would bet most of them have spent AT LEAST 1 decade bombarding their genes with refined carbs. That would be approx 520 weeks.

This study evaluated 10 weeks of healthier lifestyle changes versus 520 weeks of preprogrammed genetic expression. Is it any wonder there was no change? Give the study AT LEAST 6 months to a year.

AJCN — Abstracts: Sloth et al. 80 (2): 337

Read entire article here

Effects of a Dietary Portfolio of Cholesterol – (08-04-03)

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Effects of a Dietary Portfolio of Cholesterol-Lowering Foods, vs Lovastatin on Serum Lipids and CRP

The pharmaceutical companies are scrambling to find a drug that lowers CRP levels. Well–look no further–Mother Nature has provided us with the tools already.

In this study we find that a mixed dietary approach at lowering cholesterol and CRP was as effective as lovastatin. I’m not being cynical here–I truly do wonder why a study like this published in JAMA does not get any press. Can the pharmaceutical influence be so powerful as to suppress this kind of info from the general public???

JAMA — Abstracts: Jenkins et al. 290 (4): 502

Read entire article here

Should Eggs Add to Your Cholesterol Per Day: 4 Things to Change

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There have been many bad recommendations perpetuated over the years about how much cholesterol per day you should take in. Do eggs count?  This confusion has been created by national organizations (American Heart, American Cancer, American Diabetic Association) combined with mainstream media’s interpretation of the medical research.  The research, on the other hand, has been extremely consistent with what has been good and bad for you.  Some examples include:

Eat fish because it’s good for you, then don’t eat fish because it’s loaded with pesticides (pesticides are in farm raised, which you should not have been eating in the first place).

  • Avoid salt to protect your heart then don’t worry because it might not help (the evidence was never strong in the first place).
  • Cut back on fat to protect your heart then take fish oils (the right type of fats have always been good for us).
  • Hormone replacement therapy for women was essential, then it causes heart disease and cancer (it was NEVER a good idea to screw around with Mother Nature’s original plan).

The list is obviously longer, but you get the idea.  So what about the egg story?  Eggs contain cholesterol, so they’re bad for us, right?

Only if you mistakenly believe that the cholesterol in our diet plays a strong role in the cholesterol in your bloodstream.  You can keep avoiding eggs.

For the rest of you, eggs can be part of a healthy lifestyle, which is confirmed in this particular study.  Researchers looked across multiple studies to get an idea of just how much eggs played a role in the risk of heart attack or stroke.  Here’s what they found:

  • An average of one egg per day had no effect on heart disease (Tweet this).
  • For stroke, one egg per day lowered the risk of stroke by 9%.
  • However, in diabetics, those with the highest intake of eggs had a 54% increased risk of heart disease.
  • This same group, though had a 25% lower risk of hemorrhagic stroke.

So, the old myth that eggs are bad for your cholesterol and your heart just don’t hold true, although the story may be different for diabetics.

Here are some important considerations:

  1. I always steer patients towards “veg-a-fed” or “omega-3” eggs.  These chickens are fed flax seed, which raises the omega 3 content, a known protector of the heart.
  2. The yolk of eggs is very high in carotenoids like lutein and zeaxanthin.  They are actually good for you.
  3. If you choose to cook them in a pan, use olive oil, not Pam or anything like that.
  4. Better yet, liven the dish up with spices, jalapenos, peppers and any other veggies you’re comfortable with.  You increase the phytonutrient value with hardly any caloric increase.

As for why the response may be different in diabetics, I could make some educated guesses as to why this finding occured, but it is still my gut feeling that, in the presence of the 4 factors noted above, the effect of egg intake on the heart would be at worst, neutral, and at best, protective.

How do you like your eggs?

Infections lead to heart disease – (07-18-02)

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Predisposition to Atherosclerosis by Infections

This article adds further weight to the contribution of infections to cardiovascular disease. There is a growing list of factors that contribute to risk, and many, if not most, can be managed with lifestyle changes…CRP, cholesterol, homocysteine, HDL cholesterol and now infections. Maintaining a lifestyle that supports healthy immune function (avoiding refined carbs, lots of fruits and veggies..) can help lower risk of infections and possibly lower CVD risk.

Circulation — Abstracts: Prasad et al. 106 (2): 184

Read entire article here